My Brother's Keeper
by Indulgence-Ahoy
Summary: A happy ending. That's all Sans ever wanted. Now that they had achieved it, however, what's next? When memories of his creation and purpose start to return, how will Sans cope? Can Papyrus and his friends convince him that his story is not over and save him from his ultimate given fate? Warning: Mentions of suicidal thoughts, mental/emotional abuse. W.D. Gaster.
1. The End

A happy ending. That's all that he ever wanted. It had been such an impossible goal for such a long time that he had never given much thought as to what a happy ending would actually entail. It was like dreaming of eating a perfect cake but not being able to describe the flavor or the ingredients. You just knew that when you ate it, it would be perfect.

And by all accounts it was a perfect ending. Everyone was free. Some monsters had decided to stay underground, sure, but this time it was their choice. Frisk got the family they wanted and their new mom Toriel got the school she dreamed about. Alphys and Undyne were together as a couple (finally!) and Asgore was finding some inner peace, and ... Papyrus, well, Papyrus was always happy. Sans always admired this about his brother, his undying hope in the face of anything. His brother had always been the light out of his dark moods. Even when the most horrible happened, especially when the most horrible happened and either or both of them died in the cycles of resets that plagued them for … oh so many years.

All of that was over now. No more resets. During that first night of freedom in the Overland, Frisk had promised him quietly and with careful hand gestures to never reset again. They both felt it in their hearts that they were no longer possible, the promise was made. Sans didn't believe in promises but he believed in Frisk and that had been enough.

A perfect happy ending.

It had been then when the bad dreams began.

At first they had been sporadic and had no real memory of them. A random bad night blamed on the stress of settling in a new place or dealing with humans that were either too afraid or too curious about monsters. Sans was grateful that others in their group where naturally talented in dealing with strangers, taking the responsibility away from him. If Sans were to be completely honest with himself, he would have chosen to stay in the Underground. The familiar surroundings made him feel better. He knew how to read monsters and what to say to them. After all, he had repeated the same conversations, how many times? In a ironic way, Sans missed knowing the outcome. He was practically missing the pain after the injury had healed. He almost felt numb.

Useless.

He stayed because at least here he could pretend to have some purpose by working odd jobs. It wasn't all bad. He enjoyed on going out stargazing with Frisk and Papyrus. Tori was always fun to hang around with. Her easy conversation and ready humor always made him feel at ease. Alphys and Undyne's, for lack of a better word, aggressive acceptance of the human world made him smile and almost, almost, feel bad for the human world.

He loved them all. He was just in their way. Why didn't he just go back to the Underground and disappear?

It had been then when the tiredness had increased.

It was unfair of him to feel this way, Sans reasoned. Everybody had to suffer and give up so much to make it happen. Sure, he remembered things other didn't. He made horrible choices that nobody else knew about. Even Frisk didn't remember as much as he did. Maybe Flowey remembered, but who knew with him. That flower had his own set of problems.

Sans suspected that Papyrus had some memory of the resets. The taller skeleton would make odd comments now and then about remembering things he shouldn't in this timeline but would always hand wave them away as an odd occurrence. Vague as it was, Sans knew he should probably sit down with him and talk. It was just not something the smaller skeleton was willing to revisit at the moment.

Besides,

No point. No point to it now.

It was all over.

It had been then when the dark fantasies had started.

He would never do it. He would never step over the tall cliff's edge a short way from their new home. He would never go into the forest right outside their settlement and get lost. He would never step in front of that car coming down the road. He would never. Never, ever. He would not be the cause of more despair. But the thoughts still came. In a perverse way, they were relaxing. It was a way out that was comforting just for being a possibility. Nobody needed to know. It was all in his head.

At least he thought so.

The tall, smiling dark man had been a surprise.

He had first appeared in the darkest corner of his room. Just standing there, without moving. His empty smile mimicking Sans resting grin. His mere presence had woken up Sans from an already fragile dream. At first, the skeleton had reacted defensively, his left eye alight with magic. The dark figure had laughed quietly at his reaction, startling Sans. The laughter sparked recognition in his mind. Something at the edge of his memory told him that he should know who this stranger was.

The laughter continued. He sounded very pleased with himself and at the same time, condescending towards Sans. Panic started building up in the skeleton. He had forgotten something important, he was sure of it now. What was it?

The man motioned him forward, excitedly. Sans was sure that this was a bad idea but pushed his feet out of bed and unto the floor.

"who are you?" He asked taking a step forward.

The figure didn't answer. He continued beckoning him forward, growing impatient. As he did this, however, the stranger's form wavered and flickered.

Sans stopped when he noticed the flickering. "this is a dream" He told himself. "this is not real"

The tall dark man's grin melted into rage. He shifted as if he was made of dark water and opened his mouth to shout, but as he did, whatever force was keeping there ran out. His form dissipated as his mouth vocalized one lone word.

"[SANS]"

A headache spread across his skull as memories. His original memories. Started to return.

It had been then when the bad times started.


	2. Intrusive Thoughts

Papyrus woke to the sound of something heavy hitting the floor. He sat up on his bed rubbing his eyes, keeping his ears alert for more noises.

There were none.

He got up regardless. At their new home in the Overland, Sans and Papyrus bedrooms were across from each other instead of next to each other like at their old home. It was not as easy to listen for sounds of distress in this setup. Sans had always been prone to nightmares and would talk in his sleep about strange things that befuddled his brother. Some times he would naturally fall back into a deeper sleep, other nights, too many of them, Sans had needed comfort and reassurance that everything would be alright. Papyrus was always ready for those nights.

For a few months after leaving the Underground, Sans seemed to have no trouble sleeping soundly through the night. In fact, he had been unusually active taking on any job that came their way. This had made Papyrus very happy as he was sure this was exactly what his brother needed to be happy himself. But then he started noticing that along with the new activity and better sleep, Sans had gotten quieter. Withdrawn. He would still joke and make his silly puns that he loved so much, but as each day passed they felt more and more forced. Papyrus had tried many times to get him to open up about what was bugging him, only for Sans to either give him a non answer or change the subject all together. About the only thing that felt obvious to Papyrus was that Sans was having a bit of a problem adjusting to their new living situation. Which was unfortunate because Papyrus found humans to be so fascinating! Surely Sans would come around, he just needed time, right?

But the bad dreams had come back, and this time Sans barely made any noise through them. The first time Papyrus had become aware of their return had been just a couple of weeks before, when he had come home early from his newest job as a server at a restaurant, and found Sans sleeping on the couch, breathing shallow and sweating profusely. This had scared the taller skeleton terribly and it had taken several tries of shaking and calling his name for Sans to open his eye sockets. He had looked as confused as Papyrus felt. He claimed to have no memory of any bad dreams and assured Papyrus that everything was fine. Just a bad day at work. Everybody had those, right?

Right?

Just regular bad dreams.

Right.

Papyrus rolled his shoulder bones back and walked gingerly to his brother's bedroom door and listened in. At first he couldn't hear anything. Blast these thick human made doors. Then he heard it. A shuffle followed by another. Wheezing. And then, suddenly, as it had been suppressed for a long time, a sob.

Papyrus's hand flew to the door handle but stopped. He knew how much Sans treasured his privacy and he didn't want to upset him more. He retrieved his hand and knocked softly instead.

"SANS?" he asked quietly. "BROTHER, ARE YOU WELL?"

No response, but the sobs quieted.

"SANS?" he called out again.

He waited for two heartbeats and was about to open the door when Sans cracked it open.

"i'm fine" he said quietly, rubbing his head. "just forgot where the edge of the bed was" He smiled self consciously.

"YOU ARE "NOT FINE" BROTHER" insisted Papyrus "I HEARD YOU ..."

"i'm fine" interrupted Sans dryly. He was instantly regretful of his tone when he saw Papyrus face drop. He sighed and winked at his brother. "i'm sorry bro. i'm just really tired ... and sore"

"OH..." Papyrus could not argue that Sans did look very tired. Maybe this was something better addressed over a hot breakfast. He would get extra early to get one done before either of them had to go to work. "ALRIGHT. WANT ME TO GET YOU ANYTHING? A GLASS OF MILK? A PLATE OF SPAGHETTI? "

"nah. thank you for the offer"

They both looked at each other for a moment. The smallest hint, the subtlest indication of wanting company would've been enough but all Papyrus found was Sans slowly closing his door.

"OK. WELL THEN, HAVE A GOOD NIGHT BROTHER"

"night ... bro" The door closed with a soft click. Followed by another as the lock was put into place.

Papyrus was suddenly overcome with a dreadful feeling he couldn't quite place. Sans locked his door often. This was not unusual. Then, Why was it bothering him so much? Why was he afraid that it would never open again?

The tall skeleton shook his head. He was tired and overthinking things. Both him and his brother would feel better after getting some sleep. He would surprise Sans with a nice stack of spaghetti pancakes. His best ever! Everything will be ok. Right?

Right?

* * *

 _His first memory was that of a authoritative but gentle voice._

 _"Your name is Sans"_

 _In the darkness, he marveled at this. He understood these words._

 _"Your name is Sans" the voice repeated patiently._

 _Where had he learned the meaning of these words? Who was it that taught him this?_

 _"Your name is Sans" repeated the voice again. The sound of paper being scribbled on. A click and the sound of a tape running. "What is your name?" they asked._

 _He opened his eye sockets, blinking a couple of times to adjust his vision. The room they were in was dimly lit but he could see the voice's face a bit. Sans tilted his head a little bit to the right to get a better look._

 _"What is your name?" The question was repeated with some more emphasis._

 _"Sans" he answered. The man grinned and Sans grinned back._

 _"Great! Fantastic!" The man said and scribbled something else on the notebook he had been holding. He then picked up the recorder next to him on a table and cleared his throat. "Activation has been successful. Subject seems to be taking on assignation very well. Next we will..."_

 _"Gaster" Sans said thoughtfully._

 _The man stopped his recording to look at the young skeleton. "I beg your pardon?"_

 _"My name is Gaster" Sans looked at his hands. They looked wrong. Too small. Too young. "But its also Sans?" He looked up at the man, who was now staring at him, his expression unreadable under all the shadows._

 _"Your name is Sans" he corrected him, not leaving any room for further discussion. He pointed at himself. "I'm Dr. Gaster. You will address me as such"_

 _The writing on the notebook continued. Sans could've sworn it sounded angry. He looked down confused. He guessed he was wrong. Sans was a perfectly good name._

 _"Your name is Sans" repeated Gaster. He pointed to himself "and I'm?"_

 _"Dr Gaster" said Sans carefully._

 _"Repeat"_

 _"I'm Sans and you're Dr. Gaster" said the young skeleton even more carefully._

 _"Repeat 10 more times"_

 _Sans repeated it 10 times, then 20 more, then 30 more until his throat felt like it would never work properly again._

 _The dark man grinned. Sans grinned back._


	3. Feelings

The Core hummed providing magic electricity to the monsters still living in the old monster capital. It had been decided to let it continue running at a diminished capacity. Alphys had trained a few monsters and even a couple of adventurous humans on its monthly maintenance and even set up some monitoring systems to keep an eye on it from her new home in the Overland. All in all, it had been a smooth enough transition.

The area around the Core was now mostly deserted. Occasionally, one could see a monster traveling through carefully labelled halls to prevent them from stumbling across a forgotten puzzle. It was a quiet place full of flickering lights and random mechanical noises from deep inside its systems.

It was home for now.

The tall dark man stared at his creation from on top of a large pipe. It annoyed him that the system he had so lovingly crafted had been modified in his absence. There were systems and programs in place he didn't recognize. It didn't matter that they worked perfectly and in some ways improved upon his original design. The Core was HIS creation and how dare anyone tinker with it. He had paid the ultimate price for it when it had been first activated. It had been somebody's misguided actions (certainly not his!) that had caused the accident that put him in his current state. As soon as he remembered who that monster had been...

Oh he loved having hands again.

He brought them up to his face and flexed them several times marveling at their movement. He enjoyed the feeling as he stroked each and every single finger bone against his cheeks. His chin. His cracks.

He frowned. The deep cracks over his left eye and under his right eye had to be dealt with. A good portion of the back of his year was still missing as well. Not to forget his arms and legs were mostly ... not there.

He was not quite presentable yet. The last thing he wanted was to show up in front of his son looking ... looking ... well like a head with hands. He was sure his son (whose name escaped him at the moment) would have have a negative opinion about it. And after all, one had one's dignity.

One's dignity. The tall dark man tapped a finger against his chin in deep concentration.

"I ..." he vocalized enjoying the sound "I am ... " Three more taps.

"I am Gaster" He smiled and raised his invisible arms towards the sky.

"I AM DR. W.D. GASTER!" He shouted. He repeated it 10, 20, 30 times until laughter overtook him.

It was just as matter of time. After all, just being in the mere presence of the thief had restored him if only a little bit. He had overestimated how far he could wonder from the Core before he would be pulled back. It had been an exhausting but informative experience. He had never expected to find the barrier destroyed and monsters leaving the Underground. Among them the one who had stolen his soul.

His magic.

His life.

His son. Whose name he was pretty sure was as elegant as his.

What was it, again?

* * *

 _"His name is Papyrus" Gaster said as he held a wriggling one year old in his arms. The tone in his voice was unlike anything Sans had heard the scientist use before. It was almost like a purr. Gaster tenderly stroked the baby skeleton's head and bopped his nose. He seemed to suddenly remember that Sans was looking on and straightened his back and cleared his throat._

 _"From now on" he continued reverting back to authoritative tone that Sans was more familiar with. "Your job is to care for and protect him with your life, until such time when I deemed it no longer necessary. Do you understand?"_

 _Sans eyes flicked to the baby briefly. He WAS cute. For a baby. A fragile little baby. Baby could grow back limbs, right? You know, just in case one happened to be new at this whole alive situation and not exactly experienced in handling fragile things._

 _"Yes" He said looking back at Gaster. "I just have one question"_

 _"Yes?"_

 _"How?"_

 _Much to Sans' surprise, Gaster looked amused by the question._

 _"I'll train you" He said bouncing Papyrus in his arms causing the baby to giggle. "I'll make sure you are the guardian my son deserves"_

* * *

Sans walked down the hallway between his bedroom and the main living area. He had avoided sleep the rest of the night and instead, had sat on the floor with his back against the foot of his bed with his eyes closed trying his best not to lose control again. The rush of conflicting emotions and fragmented memories had left him exhausted. He needed to get out and get some air.

He would usually just teleport out into the forest but he couldn't muster the necessary concentration for it and magic took him a lot more effort in the Overland than it did in the Underground. He just couldn't muster the energy at the moment.

Suddenly, he became aware of the cheerful singing coming from the kitchen. Oh no, Papyrus was already up. He hadn't counted on that. He hoped he could sneak out before he was noticed.

Unfortunately, he had to walk by the entrance of the kitchen in order to get to the front door. He peeked around the corner into the kitchen and saw that Papyrus' back was to him. He was merrily flipping a … very saucy looking pancake. Sans' stomach flipped right along with it.

Slowly and quietly, he took as long a step as his short legs allowed him to. Then another. Another and he would be out of view. He took it.

"BROTHER! YOU'RE AWAKE!"

Of course.

Sans sighed and put his hands in his jacket's pockets. "hey, bro"

"WHAT A SURPRISE! TODAY IS PERFECT FOR SURPRISES! HERE'S MINE!" Papyrus motioned to the kitchen table with a flourish. "I MADE US A THREE COURSE BREAKFAST!"

Sans looked at the carefully arranged table. The three bottles of ketchup purposely placed around his plate. The steaming pasta pancakes on a platter surrounded by other assorted pasta dishes. Hell, there were even freshly picked flowers in a vase, even though neither of them cared for flowers too much. Papyrus training at the restaurant was showing.

His brother was really too cool.

His brother.

His … brother.

Sans left hand flew to his chest and clawed at his jacket. The pain was overwhelming. Everything had been a lie. He. He was a lie.

Papyrus rushed over to him noticing his distress.

"BROTHER, ARE YOU UNWELL AGAIN?" He asked trying to get Sans to look him in the eyes.

Sans gritted his teeth at the word. Lie. His eyes squeezed shut to keep tears from flowing.

"SANS! PLEASE ANSWER ME!" "WHATEVER IT IS, TALK TO ME" Papyrus softened his voice. "PLEASE. LET ME HELP. PLEASE BROTHER"

"we're not brothers" Sans chocked out. His eyes went wide. Saying it aloud had made the memory all too real.

"we're not brothers" he said again in a whisper, stepping away from Papyrus.

"WHAT … WHAT DO YOU … MEAN?" said Papyrus completely at a loss. "OF COURSE WE ARE. YOU'RE MY BROTHER" He reached out for Sans.

"no. we're not" growled Sans as he teleported away.

"SANS!" shouted Papyrus grasping at empty air. He fell to his knees and cried.


	4. Chosen Relationships

Undyne had a lot of opinions about humans and their world, a lot of them being the kind that one would probably not mention in the presence of children. The ration between favorable and unfavorable notions shifted depending on the time of the day and whether Undyne had actually talked to a human recently other than Frisk. Undyne wasn't a middle of the road type of monster, so one had to take her rants with a grain of salt composed of millions of other grains of salt.

Let's just say that "Hate" and "Dislike" were in the same general range.

On the other hand, if Undyne liked something, or someone. You knew it. Once she had decided you were her friend, oh boy, you knew it. She would beat it into you if she had to. Alphys had been the only exception to this rule. Undyne had actually been shy about her feelings towards her. It had been in all honesty, really, really cute. Alphys had come to this conclusion once she had given herself time to sit down and think about her relationship with the former Royal Guard Captain. Every time Undyne blushed and acted meekly around her, she had to muster every ounce of self control to not go into a fit of giggles that no doubt would embarrass both of them. In private however, many a pillow found itself hugged against Alphy's giggling and blushing snout.

It was very weird for Alphys to feel this way. After having spent more of her lifetime filled with self doubt and later on with crippling guilt regarding her decisions in the True Lab, it was hard for her to accept her new situation without looking back and feeling like she simply didn't deserve it. Undyne would have none of it and had enough confidence for the both of them. She had become Alphy's rock and both of them worked hard on helping all monsters to adapt to their new living situation. Especially the Amalgamates, most of them having chosen to stay close to or in the Underground.

Alphys was now working with human scientists over the internet, exchanging notes and tips. She had been shocked to find out that there was such a thing as human magic users, although they were rare and human magic was very limited compared to monster magic.

Undyne had her gym classes and dodge ball tournaments.

Something about having a monster throwing a ball at you at high speeds then having her congratulate you on being such a good survivor, really appealed to monsters and humans alike.

Alphys had made a mental note to write a paper about this phenomenon sometime.

At moment, however, she had a skeleton sobbing on the other end of the line.

"Pap … Papyrus … I can't understand you!" She looked pleadingly towards their bathroom door, the sounds of Undyne taking a shower still going strong. The fish monster really liked long showers. In the Underground, monsters didn't use showers, their magical bodies naturally taking care of any cleansing they needed. Undyne just liked standing under running water for extended periods of time.

Alphy's sighed. She really didn't feel like the right reptile for consoling Papyrus and whatever his dilemma was. Something about Sans, which was even more worrisome, but she couldn't get any more info out of the tall skeleton to work with.

"Take a deep … deep breath" She said trying again. She heard him inhale for an extremely long time then finally exhale, only to continue his sobbing and mumbling with renewed vigor. Ok. That was it. "Hold on for a minute. I'm … I'm getting Undyne"

She walked into the bathroom holding the phone against her chest, the fog from the shower immediately clouding her glasses. Despite this, she could see Undyne's silhouette behind the shower curtain, completely unaware of her entrance to the bathroom. Her mind carelessly wondered into how much this set up resembled many scenes from the animes she and Undyne watched and blushed. She then remembered why she was there and cleared her throat loudly.

"Undyne!" she called startling the fish monster. "Papyrus needs to talk to you!"

The shower curtain flew open causing Alphys to peep.

"What? Why?" Undyne said looking annoyed but still turning off the water. She glared at the phone receiver that Alphys was holding.

The reptile leaned over and whispered "I think he and Sans got into a … a fight … and he's … very upset"

"WHAT?" Undyne grabbed the phone from Alphys hand. "It's like physically impossible for those two nerds to have a serious fight. Papyrus is probably just upset that Sans didn't eat his latest pasta dish or something" She winked at Alphys with a smile and put the receiver to her ear.

Her smile quickly changed into a concerned look when she heard Papyrus crying.

"Papyrus!, PAPYRUS!" she yelled into the receiver making her girlfriend wince. "I CAN'T UNDERTAND A WORD YOU ARE SAYING. STOP CRYING!"

Alphys motioned Undyne to bring it down a notch. She figured that shouting wouldn't help calm down Papyrus.

But it did.

"Ok. Tell me what happened" Undyne said in a softer voice and giving Alphys a thumbs up "Uh uh … uh uh … yeah … yeah I have noticed too, but you know, Sans has always been like that. Ok … ok … yeah well …woah … HE DID WHAT? THAT LITTLE JERK!"

A renewed string of upset sounds started coming from the phone. Only this time, they sounded angry.

"WHY ARE YOU DEFENDING HIM?" exclaimed Undyne at the receiver holding it away from her face. Alphys raised her eyebrows. This certainly sounded waaaayy more serious than she expected. "HOW DARE HE TELL YOU THAT YOU AIN'T HIS BROTHER?!"

Alphys gasped.

The phone went quiet.

Undyne bit her lip and brushed her red fins back. She brought the phone back to her ear. "Papyrus, look, I'm sorry, ok? We're coming over and we'll look for him ok? Paps, you still there?"

A very small "Nyeh" came from the other end.

"We'll be there in few and when we find your stupid brother, I'll kick some sense into him" Undyne tapped the end call button before Papyrus could respond to that last statement. She looked at Alphys who was wriggling her hands in worry.

"Godammit" the fish monster said reaching for a towel.

* * *

It had been next to a miracle that Sans hadn't ended up phased into the middle of a tree trunk or a rock after teleporting blindly. Instead, he had landed in the middle of a clearing and had rolled into some berry bushes. He had just stayed there for a few minutes, lying on his back and staring at a cloudy late autumn sky. He got up shakily and trudged into a nearby rock formation. At least in this new place he was somewhat hidden from view.

He rubbed his head. The headache from the previous night was returning full force. He looked around trying to place where he was. He doubted he was too far away. His teleportation had always been limited to short distances. Still, he couldn't recognize any of his surroundings.

He leaned on his right side letting his head rest against a smooth rocky surface. He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. He couldn't believe how horrible he had just been to Papyrus. He couldn't even be sure that all those memories coming into his skull were even true. Maybe they were just delusions created by … who knows what.

He placed his left hand on his chest and rubbed the area that was said to host a monster's soul. Tears rolled down his cheeks unto his hands.

They were true. He knew they were true.

* * *

 _Memories flooded in of time spent learning how to take care of a baby and eventually a toddler. Despite his initial doubts, Sans soon found himself enjoying his new duties. Papyrus was easy to love, if exhausting to keep up with. He was fairly young himself, he soon found out as Gaster made a comment that maybe 12 was too young to let him take care of his son. Followed by how he simply didn't have to the time to age him longer. Sans didn't quite understand what he meant by that but at least now he had an idea on how old he was supposed to be._

 _A year went by. Papyrus was growing up fast. The moment he figured out walking, he was running and the as soon as his first words came, he had a lot to tell. Gaster couldn't be prouder. He would parade his son around Snowdin any time he had the chance. Sans would trail behind them quietly and always smiling. He was known among the townspeople as Gaster's ward. An abandoned young skeleton adopted by the brand new Royal Scientist. He often heard about how lucky he was and how generous Dr. Gaster was._

 _Sans tried not to think about it too hard. He couldn't remember anything before waking up in the room behind their house with Gaster telling him what his name was. Well that wasn't entirely true. Now and then, vague memories of times before the room would pop into his head, and there things he knew how to do, like reading and writing, that he didn't remember learning. He had tried to ask Gaster about these curious things a few times, but every time Gaster had reacted crossly and punished him with extra chores or studies, because if he had time to think about nonsense, he had time to better himself._

 _Another year went by. Dr. Gaster started to leave Sans and Papyrus by themselves for extended periods of time as he started taking on more complex projects at a new lab just outside New Home. There were talks of a massive construction project starting soon there and that Dr. Gaster was the mastermind behind it._

 _It was during these absences that Sans and Papyrus truly bonded. Sans enjoyed reading to the younger skeleton, especially books that had not been chosen by Gaster for his son; all of them educational and not particular interesting to Papyrus._

 _They also played a lot outside and Sans even allowed himself to make friends with one of the local children. A fire elemental a few years older than him called Grillby who would sneak burgers out of his parent's restaurant for them to eat "secretly" next to the river north of the town._

 _Papyrus, of course, was friends with everybody, even if they didn't know it. Sans considered himself among those friends until one day when they were visiting the local library returning some books a brand new librarian had asked Papyrus what their names were._

 _"I'M PAPYRUS!" he declared then turned around and pointed to him "HIS NAME IS SANS. HE'S MY BROTHER!"_

 _The librarian gushed and made small friendly conversation with the toddler while Sans stood there stunned. He had no clue where Papyrus had gotten it into his head that they were brothers. Maybe from the books they had been reading recently? One of them did have a couple of characters that were siblings. He opened his mouth to correct him but he didn't have the heart to do it. He liked being called a "brother". It was the best feeling ever._

 _Maybe he just wouldn't encourage it and Papyrus would eventually forget all about it._

 _But he didn't. Papyrus took to calling him "BROTHER!" all the time and every time he did it, Sans couldn't help but smile a little broader._

 _Until the time Papyrus had said it in front of his father. That time Sans didn't smile at all._

 _"He's not your brother" Gaster had said sitting Papyrus on his knee. He had just gotten back from a weeklong trip to the Capital. He was tired and not in a very good mood._

 _"YES HE IS!" Papyrus balled up his little hands over his legs_

 _"Sans" said Gaster looking over at the young skeleton with a disapproving look. "What do you know about this?"_

 _"HE READS TO ME! HE PLAYS WITH ME!" yelled Papyrus before Sans could think of anything to say "HE'S ALWAYS WITH ME! I LOVE HIM! HE'S MY BROTHER!"_

 _Papyrus nodded as if he had said the most obvious thing in the world. Both Gaster and Sans stared at him after that outburst. Eventually Gaster returned his gaze towards Sans and all that the short skeleton could manage in way of response was a resigned shrug._

 _Dr. Gaster considered all of this. It sounded like Papyrus had reached this conclusion on his own rather than being influenced by Sans. Maybe it wasn't such a bad thing for them to consider themselves brothers. It would certainly make Sans more loyal and dedicated towards Papyrus. And it was only logical since the townsfolk already thought that Sans was adopted. The Core project shouldn't take more than a couple of years to complete. After that he would have the means for him and Papyrus to move to the Capital. He would still be young enough to make him forget this whole "brothers" business easily._

 _"Fine, fine." he said dismissively. "Why don't you and your "brother" go get me some tea?" He saw Sans' shoulders relax. Papyrus giggled and jumped off his knee. He ran over to his brother and grabbed his hand as he practically dragged him into the kitchen._

 _Gaster smiled to himself. All of this was just a necessary evil. After all, Papyrus wasn't really bonding with Sans, but rather with the piece of Gaster's soul that resided in him. He had created Sans because he couldn't trust anyone else with the care of his only offspring. Sans was just a temporary replacement while he worked on getting them to the capital with the status and power his family deserved._

 _This was just all temporary._


	5. Reasons

Papyrus was upset. Undyne told herself for easily the 10th time that morning. Papyrus was upset for a good reason and therefore he didn't deserve to be thrown out a window, even though he would be fine. Really, there was no harm in one small throw. It may even be cathartic.

She would feel better.

She clenched her fists and turned to the skeleton only to be stopped by a paw on her forearm. Undyne looked down to Alphys who was firmly shaking her head no. The fish monster dropped her shoulders and let an exasperated sigh/growl. She rolled her eyes in a fine-but-I-swear-something-is-getting-thrown-soon-or-I'm-going-to-scream kinda way.

Papyrus had stopped crying before they had gotten to the brother's home. Now he was in an eerie funk and his loud voice was several levels lower. His usual exuberant energy had been replaced by this heavy resigned purpose. Napstablook could probably take notes.

His whole demeanor was driving Undyne crazy. This wasn't her friend! This was the wrong Papyrus! It was not like she hadn't seen the tall skeleton upset before but he would usually bounce back with greater determination within moments. Seeing him this way. Seeing him so depressed…

It pissed her off.

No.

It terrified her.

AND that pissed her off.

Whatever Sans had said to him, he'd better take it back with interest. Undyne liked Sans. Maybe she didn't quite get him but she liked him because she knew that despite his lazy and careless personality, he was very reliable, especially when it came to Papyrus. She knew it in her gut that something very bad was going on below the surface and she was going to fix it for her friends.

Papyrus story had not changed from their phone conversation, which meant they had no more clues to go from. Sans had had a nightmare that upset him and didn't want to talk about it (usual Sans). Papyrus had decided to have a talk about it over a pasta breakfast (usual Papyrus) and that for some reason THAT upset Sans even more (unusual Sans) to the point that he had declared that they were no longer brothers (very wrong Sans!).

Alphys shyly suggested that they check San's room. At first, Papyrus was against it but changed his mind when Undyne totally ignored him and kicked the door open.

Sans' Overland room was not much different from his Underground one. Chaos reigned here. There were clothes (mostly socks), papers and other assorted stuff strewn everywhere. The furniture was mostly new. About the only thing that Sans had decided to bring with him from their Underground home had been his bed. Otherwise, he had acquired a small table and a couple of bookcases from second hand stores. The bookcases had already been filled beyond capacity as there were several stacks of books in front of them.

Papyrus knew that his brother loved to read, especially about Science and Space stuff. He just hadn't realized how much and this nagged at him. He made a mental note to get Sans the biggest and bestest book about space and science he could find for Christmas. If Sans still liked him by then that is.

"Pap … Papyrus?" Alphys asked. Papyrus looked up and realized that maybe he had been staring at the stacks of books on the floor for a little too long.

"Cheer up, Papyrus!" said Undyne slapping the skeleton on the back then hugging him with her right arm and motioning to the entire room with her left "Do you see anything out of the ordinary?"

Papyrus looked around. "I CAN'T TELL"

Undyne sighed but didn't let go of Papyrus. "I guess it would be hard to tell among all this mess, huh? She scratched the back of her left fin and directed her attention towards Alphys. "Babe, have you found anything?"

Alphys smiled at her and shook her head. She had been idly looking under the pillows and sheets without success. She really didn't want to snoop around Sans stuff too much but at the same time, she couldn't help but feel a little bit curious.

Alphys headed over to the small table and shuffled through the papers. She could hear Undyne trying her best to cheer Papyrus up behind her. Most of the papers were bills and seemingly random notes with dates on them. Others had drawings of constellations and calculations. Sans and Alphys rarely talked nowadays but she knew he was very smart and knowledgeable about magical and scientific theories. For some reason she couldn't quite figure out, he would always seemed try to hide this behind puns and other jokes if their conversations got too deep.

The small reptile was about to give up on her search when she noticed something hard under one of them. It was a small silver key. She turned it over in her claws. It didn't look like a human made key. She quickly looked around but didn't see anything that it would fit into.

"Papyrus?" she said walking over and holding the key up for Papyrus to look at "Do you know where this goes to?"

Papyrus blinked at the small key a couple of times. "NO … I THI … NO, I DON'T THINK SO"

"This is not getting us ANYWHERE!" said Undyne throwing up her hands. "This was a great idea Babe, but I think we are just going to have to go out and search for that no good brother of yours and get answers out of him the OLD FASHION WAY"

For the first time since they had come over, Alphys saw Papyrus straighten himself up and get some energy back into his voice.

"UNDYNE, NO! NO SUXPLEXING MY BROTHER!"

"Then you better find him before I do!" the fish monster said showing her fangs in a wide smile. She bolted out of the room and out of the house. "You better get your ass moving!"

"UNDYNE!" called Papyrus running after his old mentor.

"W... WAIT GUYS!" said Alphys putting the key into one of her pockets and trying her best to follow the two of them. She cold already tell it was going to be a long day.

* * *

Sans headache had only gotten worse. He was also getting very hungry, but couldn't muster the energy to get up and try to find his way back into town. Every bone ached and felt heavy. He was sure if he moved too much he was just going to collapse. He felt pathetic.

At least the Forest was peaceful and he vaguely appreciated that. Maybe he could stay here forever and just sleep.

Papyrus would get worried. Sure. But he would eventually move on. Their friends would see to that.

Sans closed his eyes.

No.

He really needed to get back. At least clear up the air with Papyrus. He really, really should.

He was so tired though.

He owed it to Papyrus to tell him the truth. They both had been through so much for him to just give up like this.

But was it worth it now?

Yes.

In all the time loops where he had decided to come clean to Papyrus and tell him about the resets and loads and how many times he had failed to save him from being killed. Papyrus had always, accepted his explanation. Maybe in some of the loops there was more doubt than in others but regardless of it, he would always accept this because …

"YOU"RE MY BROTHER!"

That had always been the driving force of all his trying again and again to fix the anomaly that was causing the time loops, but the resets that would erase everyone's memories and mangle his own, still happened. He would always remember just enough to be aware but details always escaped him. Monsters still died. His brother still died sometimes. It was maddening.

Every time he saw the world melt around him during a reset, he could feel his soul be pulled into a new timeline. Even when he had been killed his soul wouldn't shatter as his body turned to dust. Instead he would wake up back in his room. His body fully healed.

And every time he had felt stronger.

His blue magic, which had always been quite strong, got more versatile. He found that he could do a lot more complicated attacks than the ones Gaster had trained him on. During the first few dozen resets, he trained trying to find the perfect way to protect everyone. Eventually, after resets reached the hundreds, his magic evolved into advanced telekinesis and he was not only able to apply it to his opponents but to himself, allowing him to move incredibly fast and dodge attacks. After he had lost count of the resets, teleportation had come and after that … the blasters.

The giant monster heads had been a shock when they first manifested in front of him but there was a familiarity about them that he couldn't explain. He knew, somehow, that they were the pinnacle of his power. If he couldn't win with them, he couldn't win at all.

He lost many times.

But he also won several times.

However, to his chagrin, he soon discovered that his winning did not mean the end of the resets. It just meant that the anomaly lost and would just have to try to defeat him again. The only way for him, for monster kind to win, was for the anomaly to decide to end the game.

Sans increased power had also come with the price of reduced living energy. Using magic exhausted him and had to sleep often to recover. He played off his exhaustion as laziness as to not worry Papyrus and his friends. He tried his best to avoid using his magic when he could. He always waited on attacking the anomaly until the very last chance he got because he knew he only got one shot every time loop.

Eventually, Sans gave up. He stopped trying to stop the resets. He would just do whatever on any given time loop knowing that it didn't matter what he did. In time, he would find himself back at the beginning of the loop staring at the ceiling of his bedroom.

It was when he had stopped trying that Papyrus seemed to try harder. He wouldn't leave him alone. He would talk to him and encourage him the best way he knew how. He convinced him to take on a job as a sentry along him. Sans accepted because it was something to do and it seemed to make his brother especially happy. If he had to repeat everything, at least he got to do it with his brother.

He still cried every time Papyrus died.

Things started to change when he started going to the Ruins Door. He met Toriel there and he had found some comfort in her easy friendship and listening ear. It had been her that had made him make his first promise.

She asked him to protect the human.

And he had, in his own way. And sometimes it worked out and sometimes, he cried when Toriel died as well.

Regardless, things started to change. He started seeing a lot more different resolutions. They never made it out of the Underground, but things still changed. Sans, almost against his will, started trying again.

Then Frisk came and while the resets still happened, they were becoming more and more hopeful. Sans noticed that Papyrus was especially fond of this human. He saw something in them that he was missing. So for Papyrus, for Toriel, for everyone, he let himself trust the human.

Frisk fixed the anomaly and destroyed the barrier that had kept them trapped in the Underground. The resets were over. This had been Frisk's promise.

Everything they did now, every decision they made. They were final. No redos.

And Sans had messed it all up masterfully.

Why couldn't he keep his memories to himself? Who would know? Gaster was gone. He and Papyrus could've gone on for their rest of the lives pretending to be brothers.

He was so stupid.

Why did he tell him that? He couldn't take it back now.

But it was the truth.

It didn't matter.

There were no more resets. No more second chances.

…

…

…

Sleep came unannounced.

* * *

By the year Sans calculated he was 15 and Papyrus was 4, Gaster started leaving them on their own for 4 to 5 months at a time. The construction of the Core had not gone as planned and Gaster made it no secret that he was beyond frustrated at all the setbacks. Whenever he did make it back home, he would only stay for a few days before leaving for another extended period of time.

During his short stays, he would dedicate most of his attention to Papyrus but sometimes he would take Sans into the small lab behind their home and run some tests.

Sans hated using the ancient language that Gaster used when they had their private sessions. It was cumbersome and Sans couldn't quite get the inflexions right despite his best efforts. And honestly, sometimes he mispronounced things on purpose. This annoyed Gaster quite a bit but insisted on its usage regardless.

Papyrus had not been taught this language so far and had forbidden Sans from teaching him, stating that he would teach him personally when he got older. Sans found this curious but then again, Gaster had a lot of little rules like that.

During these sessions, Gaster would take samples and perform other kind of examinations (Sans hated this part). He also trained him on basic magic usage (Sans liked this part). Gaster also requested reports on Papyrus progress and activities to be delivered using the ancient skeleton language (Sans really hated this part). However, Sans doubted his reports were even paid attention to as Gaster tended to look distracted whenever he did them. Sometimes, Sans would include little odd details such as Papyrus growing wings or a tail, just to test Gaster's attention.

Most of the time he got away with it.

[Tell me, Sans] Gaster said looking up from his notes as Sans was reaching for the door to leave since their session was done. [Why do you think you are here?]

Sans turned around. He was used to this question. [To protect and take care of Papyrus] He recited.

[Correct.] Gaster's eyes blazed blue [Any other reasons?]

Sans felt a heavy feeling take over his soul. This was the first time there was a follow up question. He looked at the floor searching for the correct answer. His head lifted itself up so he was facing Gaster again.

[To … to obey you] He said.

[Correct.] Gaster intertwined his bony fingers together, his eyes completely blue now [And WHAT else?]

The pressure on his soul grew stronger. It was painful and Sans couldn't move. He wracked his brain trying to think of what Gaster wanted him to say.

[Noth … nothing else] He stammered.

[Correct. Don't forget that.]

His soul was released and Sans gasped for air. Gaster returned to reading his notes as if nothing had happened. Sans left the lab in a hurry. He leaned against their house and wiped the sweat on his forehead with his sleeve, the feeling of dread still fresh on his mind. He heard a couple of small footsteps come up to him. He looked to his left and saw little Papyrus standing there staring at him.

"Oh hey Paps, I thought you were taking nap" he said trying to sound as casual as possible.

[What is your reason?] Papyrus asked.

Sans froze. "Paps?" he asked barely able to keep his voice from shaking. "What … what do you mean?"

[You never took care of me nor protected me] said Papyrus. His tiny body started to tremble.

"No, Papyrus. That's not true. I always protected you"

Papyrus took a step forward his hands forming into fists. He was now fully grown up. [LIAR. YOU ARE ALWAYS LYING TO ME. YOU LET ME DIE!]

" No… Paps … I" Sans looked around. They were in a snowy field. The very same snowy field he had seen Papyrus be killed by the anomaly. By Chara.

A reset?

"No, no, no, NO!"

[YOU FAILED SANS. YOU HAVE NO REASON TO EXIST] Papyrus body dissolved into dust. In his place stood a small child holding a knife. Chara.

"NO!" He lashed out with a wild bone attack at the child.

Sans felt his eyes open but he couldn't see anything. The forest around him was ablaze with blue magic. The rock formation behind him cracked and crumbled all around him, scaring any and all animals nearby. One of the fragments bounced off others and hit his right leg hard fracturing it near the ankle.

He screamed in pain and anguish.

He got up attempting to run away from the nightmare but collapsed after a few steps unconscious.

Somewhere in town Papyrus stopped in mid sentence and grabbed at his chest. "SANS" He said looking towards the forest.

Somewhere in the Core, Dr. Gaster looked up from his reverie and smiled. The thief was closer than before.

Time to collect.


	6. Smile

"Papyrus?" asked Asgore when he noticed the skeleton's gaze suddenly become fixated towards the West. He had been in the middle of a question when he had gone quiet. "What is it?"

The former King looked over to Undyne, who shrugged her shoulders equally confused. She walked over to the tall skeleton and shook him so hard by the arm that Asgore was sure his head was going to pop loose. "PAPYRUS!"

"AAAHH" exclaimed the skeleton as he was pulled back into reality. He held his head in between his hands to stop the world from spinning. "UNDYNE! I THINK I KNOW WHERE SANS IS!"

Asgore lifted a paw to politely ask what was going on.

"What? HOW?" asked Undyne instead.

"I DON'T KNOW. I THINK … I THINK I HEARD HIM SCREAM"

Asgore opened his mouth to gently inquire as to why would Sans be screaming.

"SCREAM?" inquired Undyne instead. "WHY? WHAT'S WRONG?"

"I DON'T KNOW! ALL I KNOW IS THAT I HAVE TO GO TO HIM!" Papyrus turned to start running in the direction of the Forest.

Asgore lifted his paw again to ask if there was anything he could do to help.

Undyne tackled Papyrus to the ground, declaring that she was only doing it for his own good. They had been looking all over town for several hours before coming to Toriel's school and finding Asgore working on the grounds maintenance. All of them were tired and hungry. She wasn't about to let her friend just run off into the woods by himself because of a hunch.

Asgore looked over to the School's main building. The lunch bell was about to ring and he worried about the students coming out to enjoy lunch outside only to find a couple of monsters arguing/wrestling at the edge of the school grounds.

"Wh… What are you doing?!" Alphys ran up to the trio holding her laptop bag. She huffed and puffed for a couple of seconds catching her breath. "Majes… I mean, Asgore. Why are they fighting?"

The 9 foot tall monster raised his paws in confusion towards the cloud of arms and legs that were Papyrus and Undyne. "My dear, they started talking but said nothing"

"Well … that's not shocking" Alphys smiled at Asgore understanding all too well his confusion. She explained the events of the morning to him as best she could. "So, "she concluded "just before coming here, we decided that I should go home and try contacting some monsters online and see if they had heard from him. Unfortunately, I couldn't … find anything useful"

"That's a shame" said Asgore crestfallen. "No wonder they're upset. Poor Papyrus even thinks he heard his brother scream"

"I'm … I'm sorry?"

"He had just come up to me to say something when he said he heard his brother scream" Asgore tugged at his beard thoughtfully. "He wanted to run but Undyne was against it"

Alphys thought about this for a few seconds. "Oh my gosh! Of course! I'm so daft sometimes!"

Asgore opened his mouth to ask something again but Alphys was off running towards Papyrus and Undyne. He cleared his throat. Clearly this was a day for confusion.

"Guys! GUYS! GUUUYYYSSSSS!" screamed Alphys finally getting the arguing couple's attention. They both froze in place a mess of arms and legs. Alphys huffed. No time to waste. "PAPYRUS, YOU AND SANS HAVE THE SAME KIND …. HUFF … OF MAGIC… RIGHT?!"

Papyrus answered from somewhere under Undyne's right elbow. "YES, WE ARE BOTH USERS OF BLUE MAGIC, MORE OR LESS"

"Huff … and you said you just heard him scream, right?" Alphys took out her laptop and started typing into it one handed. "You felt it. Right?"

"YES! THAT'S WHY I MUST GO!" Papyrus struggled to get out of Undyne's iron grip.

"Alphys? What do you have in mind?" asked Undyne.

The female reptile shook her head "I can't believe I didn't think about it before" She sat down on her tail, typing furiously on her laptop. Sans teleported! I should've been able to pick up his magic trail with my laptop. It's too late for that now since it's probably faded by now but Papyrus says that he felt him. That means he's using magic again! And Papyrus and Sans are the only blue magic users that I know of"

Papyrus looked at Alphys with renewed admiration. He freed himself from Undyne and ran over to look over her shoulder. A map of the area popped up with a blue dot on it.

"HE'S IN THE FOREST. I KNEW IT!" he exclaimed excitedly.

"That's about 25 miles away!" Alphys squinted at the numbers. "Wow, I didn't know he could teleport that far" She zoomed out a little bit out to make sense of the area her friend was better. "W… What's that?"

By now Undyne and Asgore had joined in looking over Alphy's shoulder. They followed her finger to a spot to the North of Sans location. Another blue dot that seemed to be made of several other blue dots, it expanded and contracted. It moved slowly but seemed to be heading towards Sans.

"I, never seen … so…something like this before! The ratings are so chaotic! Wild!" She said, "and .. and I think It's coming from the foot of Mount Ebott"

Everyone exchanged worried glances.

"I DON'T CARE WHAT IT IS! I WILL GET THERE FIRST AND PROTECT MY BROTHER!" declared Papyrus.

"Don't be a fool! You'll never get there before that thing on foot!" exclaimed Undyne exasperated.

Asgore cleared his throat loudly. Some would argue that he growled. Alphys, Undyne and Papyrus looked at him.

"I have a truck" he said jiggling a keychain.

* * *

Sans felt as if he was floating in deep, dark void. Random memories came and went from forgotten years. He could see Gaster's face more clearly now. A smile that could be warm. Long fingers that could soothe. A voice that could provide comfort. Eyes that could approve and sparkle with pride. Yet, they didn't. Not for him. Never for him.

 _From a distance Sans could see Grillby waiting for him next to the river. At 19 years old, the fire elemental now towered over the 17 year old skeleton. Which low key annoyed Sans, because by this time he was quite convinced that there were no growth spurs coming for him. Even Papyrus, at his mere 6 years of life, was already showing signs that he was going to be quite tall himself, probably taller than his dad._

 _The thought of the Doctor made Sans rub his right arm reflexively. He shook his head; he wasn't going to ruin Grillby's news by being in one of his "moods". Behind him, he heard Papyrus exclaim something about being GREAT to a small group of monster children. It was a habit he had picked up recently from watching a new t.v. show called "The Mettaton Club"_

 _"AND REMEMBER KIDS! YOU ARE GREAT! TAKE IT FROM THE GREATEST, METTATON!" Mettaton's robotic voice would chime at the end of his show followed by a few ads for the newest Mettaton action figures. Sans just had to marvel at this. That robot knew nothing about subtlety, but hey, the kids loved them._

 _Sans looked over to the small playground where Papyrus was playing "hero" with a couple of confused slime children. "Hey, Papyrus, I'm going to go over to the river and talk to Grills. You ok here for a bit?"_

 _Papyrus nodded and waved him off cheerfully. Sans smiled and walked towards the river._

 _As he got closer, Sans noticed that the fire elemental was practically bouncing on the back of his heels. This made the skeleton raise a mental eyebrow. Grillby was usually a pretty chill dude with a quiet disposition. He rarely talked and he didn't have a visible mouth, so most monsters weren't aware of his low, rumbling voice. He wasn't fond of having to talk, being more of an actions kind of monster. He and Sans had become fast friends because of this. Sans didn't expect him to talk, nor ask probing questions as to why not. He was just happy to hang out silently or talk about whatever (if they were in the mood) without ever giving a hint of being bored with his company._

 _It was in these silences and short conversations that they confided in each other more than either of them were even aware._

 _"Hey, Grills, you look especially luminous today" Sans waved lazily. Grillby returned the wave and took three long steps until he was practically nose to nose … well ribcage to nose with Sans (damn all these tall monsters). The skeleton took a step back surprised. Grillby was usually pretty good about keeping his magic fire under control but that morning he could feel heat waves coming out of him in spades. "Woah, what is it?"_

 _"My parents agreed to let me go to the Capital!" Sparks of yellow and white flickered across the elemental's features. "To train"_

 _"…To train? Oh! The Bar! They are finally ok with it?"_

 _Grillby nodded excitedly releasing even more sparks. Sans felt a small pang of pain in his soul. Grillby was about the only monster in Snowdin he could talk to. He made a conscious effort to make sure he was still smiling. "That's great! … When?"_

 _"Next month"_

 _"Wow, fast"_

 _Grillby nodded, the smile in his eyes endearing. He reached into a small satchel he was carrying and brought out a carefully wrapped package and gave it to Sans. The skeleton opened it to reveal a delicious looking burger "I brought one for Papyrus as well"._

 _"Nice! You know you don't have to feed me every time we see each other. You can, but you don't have to" said Sans winking at his friend and sat down to enjoy his meal. Grillby sat down next to him._

 _"Well, I'm not going to be able to for a year or so"_

 _Sans took a big, careful bite out of the burger. "Hm"_

 _"Yeah"_

 _Sans made it a point to eat the burger as slowly as possible. He noticed that Grillby had put extra ketchup in it even though he had never said it, it was just the way he liked it. When he finished it, he washed his face in the river then cleared his throat loudly as he turned to face Grillby._

 _"I just hope you don't go all Capital on us and forget all of us little monsters" He grinned._

 _"Mom says that you can come over any time" said Grillby without breaking eye contact._

 _Sans grin faltered but recuperated. He was getting good at it. "Nah"_

 _"I haven't told her anything, but she knows that you must be a little lonely having to take care of Papyrus all the time when Dr. Gaster is away"_

 _"Nah, it's ok, really" Sans rubbed his arm._

 _"Sans" Grillby got up to walk over to Sans but the skeleton beat him this time by starting to walk over to the playground where Papyrus was._

 _"C'mon, you better say goodbye to Papyrus as well" Sans said not turning back "I'll never hear the end of it otherwise"_

 _"Sans!" Grillby caught up to the skeleton and grabbed his right shoulder to stop him. This caused the skeleton to involuntarily hiss in pain. Grillby's eyes narrowed. He took Sans right arm carefully but purposely and rolled up his jacket's sleeve. There were several small hairline fractures on Sans upper arm, from his elbow to about half way up to the shoulder. Blue sparks of healing magic peppered the damage. "When did this happen?"_

 _"Yesterday" Sans sighed and pulled his arm away and covered it again with the sleeve. A faint, magic blue blush on his cheeks. "I wasn't paying attention and got hit by one of the Doctor's bone attacks" He omitted that he hadn't known that they weren't practicing attacks at that moment in time. In fact, Gaster had been in the middle of trashing his own lab when Sans suddenly found himself the target of the attack._

 _Grillby made the noise he always made when he didn't believe something. It was close to a snort but more of a crackle._

 _"Look. It will be fine by tomorrow" said Sans trying to diffuse the situation. "You know that the Doctor wants me to be able to protect Papyrus if something … bad ever happens. I'm just too much of a bonehead to learn …."_

 _"Sans, you know this isn't right" Grillby interrupted, his voice barely above a whisper._

 _"It's fine" insisted Sans burying his hands in his pockets stubbornly. They stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. "Please. It's fine" He begged._

 _"Has this happened before?" Of course Grillby knew that the relationship between Sans and the Doctor was not the most pleasant ever, strained at the best of times. But he had never heard or suspected it of it getting physical._

 _"Nah" He smiled. That dammed smile. "Like I said, it was just distracted. I just need to be more careful"_

 _Grillby's fire took a blue twinge for a moment. He put his hands on Sans shoulders being extra careful of the right one. "Sans, why don't you…"_

 _"SANS! GRILLBY!" Papyrus tiny form barreled towards them. He tackled Sans' left side and grappled it giggling. "THE GREAT PAPYRUS IS HUNGRY"_

 _"Really? " said Sans rubbing Papyrus head. "I guess you look like skin and bones"_

 _Papyrus groaned but also giggled burying his face in Sans' jacket. "I DON'T HAVE SKIN!"_

 _"Oh right! My bad. Oh hey, Grillby brought one of his famous burgers for you"_

 _Grillby blinked and fumbled inside his bag for Papyrus' burger. He handed it over to the eager child._

 _"YAY! THANKS!" Papyrus took a big bite out of his gift and started choking. Sans patted on his back a couple of times until he swallowed. "IT'S GREASY"_

 _"That's what makes it good" said Sans with mock wisdom. Papyrus smiled and continued eating his burger. Sans looked up at Grillby. "I can't" His eyes said as he patted his younger brother's shoulder._

 _Grillby nodded and offered a hand to Sans. "Come find me when you're ready" he whispered to the skeleton when they shook hands._

 _He never did._

* * *

Other memories came. These … these were strange. Fragmented. Alien. They were not his own, yet they were.

In the darkness he saw blue shimmering lights. His soul or rather, the fragments that composed his soul. The fragments that had called out to him in every time line he had visited … lived. The pieces of Gaster that had survived the Core accident and been spread out through countless timelines. He had collected them without being aware of their existence. Like a flame absorbing another flame.

He saw the Core, a gigantic structure harnessing raw magic out of the planet itself. He saw himself … no Gaster, stand in the middle of the control room going over sheets and sheets of numbers and calculations. He saw the Core turn on several times only to come to an abrupt stop countless of times. He saw near fatal incidents happen causing further construction and redesigns.

He felt himself … Gaster …. Be contaminated by the raw magic leaking out of the Core. Other monsters working on the project quit scared by the side effects of this contamination. Weaklings. They had no ambition.

He had sacrified _so much_. He wasn't going to stop now. Even the King was trying to _stop him now._ The King _wanted this_. He wanted to help monsterkind. He would be a _hero_ when he was done. Just a little _longer._

 _Almost, almost._

He saw himself going home. A short break away from all those _useless_ monsters he had to work with. The King insisted on these breaks. No _appreciation_ for hard work. No _appreciation_ at all.

Papyrus was there. Too _young_ to understand the _sacrifices_ but he loved him anyway. His son.

He was also there. Sans. His creation. Disappointing. He didn't even look right. Not enough developing time.

Too independent.

Papyrus was becoming too attached to him. He was running out of time. Every time he tested and probed, he felt that the fragment of his soul inside of him becoming more and more corrupted. Different.

Every time Papyrus smiled at Sans, played with him, _listened to him,_ in his presence. Gaster felt something twinge inside of him. Jealousy? No, hate. This thing that was only supposed to be for a couple of years, this thing was stealing _time_ away from him. This thing enjoyed all the benefits of his hard work. Him and Papyrus live comfortably because of his hard work. He got to enjoy the _love_ of his son.

He wanted to say the words. He wanted to scream them at him and watch him disintegrate in front of him, but he needed to _wait._ Just a little longer.

 _Almost, almost._

In the meantime, he started using the ancient skeleton language around him more and more. Sans hated it, but moreover, this language had power not found in the regular monster language. When Sans name was said in the ancient language it hurt him, because it signaled the beginning of the end.

 _It was quite wonderful._

"NO!" Sans screamed into the void rejecting Gaster memories violently. Gaster had been in his room. He had heard him say his name in the ancient language. He wanted his soul back.

But he was dead. The words died with him.

Sans opened his eyes. His headache was making his vision blurry but he could tell he was still in the forest clearing. How long had he been out? Minutes? Hours?

He tried getting up but the pain in his leg made him rethink this. Instead he spent many minutes convincing his body into a sitting position. He could barely think straight but knew he was in a lot of trouble. He needed help.

He patted his pockets in search for his cell phone. He never turned it on, so he just kept it in his jacket in case he ever felt like playing a prank on someone and it had been quite awhile since his last prank. It drove Papyrus crazy because he was always trying to call him. He found it in his inner pocket. He took it out and hit the power button. To his immense relief, the phone powered up. He barely had signal but he should be able to at least make one call. His cell started vibrating startling him and almost making him drop it. He squinted at it trying to get his eyes to focus and realized that the vibration came from text and missed calls notifications coming in.

Most of them were from earlier that day and all of them were from Papyrus.

"i'm sorry" he muttered to the phone. "i'm so sorry"

He hit the return call button and put the cell phone up to his ear. He was starting to feel very nauseous and his vision was getting worse. He commanded himself to take deep breaths, to not panic.

The line rang. It was going to be ok.

Suddenly, he froze. A tall dark figure was just a few feet away from him.

Smiling.

That dammed smile.


	7. Promises

_Sans hated the lab behind their home. Going in there with the Doctor meant a lot of … unpleasant things. It was a well lit place where everything was perfectly organized and categorized. It smelled clean. Barren and strangely silent, the kind of silence that takes forms out of the corner of your eye and whispers things into your brain, making you react to the slightest sound. No natural light or air ever came in since there were no windows. The only ventilation provided by a small vent in one corner of the room. It probably had been a storage area before being a lab. It might've as well been a dungeon._

 _For years, he avoided going in there when the Doctor was away, but after Grillby had gone away to the Capital, he found himself more and more restless about his situation. He loved Papyrus. He wanted nothing more than to take care of his little brother, and it wasn't like his life was terrible. He had food and shelter, if something needed repair or to be bought, he just needed to write it down in the household budget and it would be taken care of. The monsters in town were friendly and treated him well enough. So the Doctor liked to tease him with comments about his place in their world and yeah, now and then he would throw things at him or slap him to correct him because he wasn't paying attention. Nevermind that. It was fine._

 _Really, he had no reason to complain and he wasn't ungrateful._

 _And what about Papyrus? The Doctor was nothing but gentle with him. He showered him with praise and gifts. He would be fine._

 _But…_

 _But every time he met with the Doctor he felt this need to run away grow inside of him. He wondered if he even could make it out of Snowdin if he tried. He had never been anywhere else, so he wasn't even sure of the way. His body wasn't the strongest. He could take a few small hits but his soul could only take one. If Gaster ever decided to use soul magic on him, well, the thought alone filled him with dread._

 _So…_

 _So… now he was in front of the door to the lab late at night, during one of the Doctor's absences, because even though he hated that place with all his being, he also knew that this place might hold answers for him._

 _Getting the small silver key to the lab hadn't been hard. Dr. Gaster always kept it in the same "hidden" place. He looked at it, took a deep breath and unlocked the door. It creaked open. He looked around quickly making sure that he hadn't been seen. Papyrus was asleep in their room but he was a light sleeper, so he knew that he only had a short amount of time before he was missed._

 _He turned on the lights and closed the door quietly behind him. The room looked so much larger than he remembered it. He stood there suddenly feeling meek and helpless. He wasn't sure what to look for, what could help. He looked over at the flat bed in one of the far corners where he would usually lay or sit, next to it was the metal chair where Gaster would sit and take notes._

 _Notes._

 _He turned to his left and looked at the wall long counter lined with filing drawers. Over it were cabinets with vials and other equipment. Next to it was a fridge were Gaster usually stored the bone marrow and other samples he took from Sans. The counter itself held a neatly arranged row of binders and larger lab equipment. It was otherwise free from clutter. A casual observer would think that nobody ever used the place._

 _He looked at the binders first. They contained records of his test results. He couldn't tell what the numbers meant, but he kept seeing the note "HP 1" in each record. Well THAT he already knew. He continued looking without luck. They were all filled with numbers and matter of fact annotations regarding him and sometimes even Papyrus. He was fairly frustrated by the time he went to open the last two drawers and found them to be locked by what looked like a puzzle lock._

 _Now this was interesting._

 _He sat down and went over the puzzle several times. It was a puzzle that required him to turn "X" into "O"s in a certain order. He tried several combinations but wasn't able to figure out. He suddenly heard Papyrus calling his name and became very aware that he had been in there for at least a couple of hours. He cursed under his breath and rushed out, making sure to lock the door behind him._

 _He found Papyrus waiting for him sleepily on the top of the stairs._

 _"SANS, WHERE WERE YOU?" he asked rubbing the sleep from his eyes._

 _"I was just getting a glass of water" he said walking up the stairs to meet him._

 _"NU-HUH" said Papyrus crossing his little arms in front of him "YOU WERE OUTSIDE"_

 _"uh.."_

 _"YOU HAVE SNOW ON YOUR SHOES!" Papyrus exclaimed smiling with triumph at catching his brother in a fib._

 _"Oh! Well I wanted my water to be cold" Sans booped Papyrus on the nose with his index finger. "Did I wake you up?"_

 _"WELL I DIDN'T HEAR YOU SNORING AND THAT WOKE ME UP"_

 _"I don't snore"_

 _"YES YOU DO!"_

 _"Really? What does it sound like?" asked Sans leading Papyrus back to bed._

 _Papyrus took a deep breath and mock snored as loudly as he could. Sans laughed. "You mean like this?" He mock snored even louder._

 _Papyrus roared with laughter and climbed unto his bed. "NO! IT WAS MORE LIKE THIS!" and didn't even pretend to mock snore anymore, now he was just growling and making noises as loud and disgusting as he could._

 _"Oh yeah! That's exactly how I sound" said Sans laughing even harder. "And you know what?"_

 _"WHAT?"_

 _"This is how you sound when …" he tackled Papyrus down on his bed "I tickle you!"_

 _They wrestled around on Papyrus bed both trying to submit each other with tickles before they both dissolved into a fit of giggles and snorts on the bed._

 _Papyrus yawned._

 _"Sleepy?" asked Sans._

 _Papyrus nodded and turned so he was on his left side so he was facing Sans. Sans reached for his blankets and covered him up and then started to get up to head on over to his own bed when Papyrus stopped him by grabbing unto his sleeve._

 _"YOU LAUGHED" he said matter of factly._

 _"Uh? What do you mean?" asked Sans sitting back down._

 _"YOU HAVEN'T LAUGHED IN A WHILE" Papyrus eyelids were getting heavy with sleep but he kept his grip on his brother's sleeve._

 _"I laugh all the time" Sans hadn't expected the 7 year old to be THAT observant, or was he being way more obvious than he thought?_

 _"NOT LIKE THAT"_

 _Sans dropped his shoulders. "I'm sorry. I pro … I'll try to laugh more,k?"_

 _Papyrus scooted closer to him and put his arm around him. He closed his eyes contented. "I LOVE YOU BROTHER"_

 _Sans put his hands on Papyrus head and stroke it gently. "I love you too"_

 _He sighed and stared at the ceiling for a while before falling asleep himself. Could he really leave him behind? What about Papyrus indeed._

 _The next day, Sans snuck into the laboratory again while Papyrus was watching a television show. This time he had brought pen and paper with him and copied the puzzle unto it. This way he could work on it inside the house. He wished it had been a number puzzle, those he could deal with easily, but he had trouble with graphical sequences. It didn't help that Papyrus kept him busy with his lessons and just general restless nature._

 _Another day went by and he was sitting on the couch with a book open on his lap. The puzzle rested on the pages and had been scribbled over and over. Just looking at it was making him sleepy and was about ready to give up on the whole endeavor when Papyrus climbed onto the couch without him noticing._

 _"IS THAT A NEW STORY BOOK?" he asked startling him._

 _"AH! No, no, just a dumb science book" he said hurriedly._

 _"WHAT IS THAT?" asked Papyrus pointing to the puzzle. "IS IT A GAME?"_

 _Sans looked over at Papyrus then at the piece of paper. "Yeah, I guess you could say that"_

 _"HOW DO YOU PLAY?" Papyrus leaned over and was looking at the paper excitedly._

 _"Ah, well, you have to figure out how to turn all these "X" into "O" in such a way that you don't go over an "X" more than once"_

 _"OOOOOOOOOOO!" Papyrus went big and round "CAN I PLAY?"_

 _"Um …" Sans considered. It was a common enough type of puzzle. If the Doctor happened to find out that Papyrus had been playing with puzzles, he could always claim that they heard about them at the Library. "Ok, sure"_

 _"YAY!" Papyrus took both the book and the puzzle and put them on his own lap. Then he put on his very serious face. He moved his finger over the puzzle instead of using the pen that Sans offered. He was quiet for a quite a while, which was a nice change of pace._

 _Sans nodded off._

 _"GOT IT!" announced Papyrus happily after what had seem only a few minutes. In actuality it had been close to an hour._

 _"Uh, what?" said Sans waking up from his nap._

 _"I SOLVED THE PUZZLE!" said Papyrus holding the piece of paper in front of his brother's face. He was beaming with pride._

 _Sans looked at the paper. At one point Papyrus must've gotten up and fetched his crayon box because the puzzle now had several numbers written in red indicating the sequence the "X" had to be touched in._

 _"Wow! You are really smart! Then again, I already knew that!" He said truly impressed._

 _"NYE HE HE HE HE!" Celebrated Papyrus "I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS!"_

 _Sans hugged him and started to carefully fold the paper to put it away when Papyrus reached for it. "NO, NO, I WANT TO SHOW DAD WHEN HE COMES HOME TOMORROW"_

 _Sans eyes went wide. He had forgotten that Gaster was coming home the next day._

 _"No, you can't" He said putting the puzzle away in his pocket. "Um… uh…. I was supposed to solve this puzzle by myself"_

 _Papyrus pouted at him. "BUT I SOLVED IT!"_

 _"I know. I'm sorry. Please don't tell him" Sans was trying his best to not sound as panicked as he felt "I'll get you other puzzles you can show him. Just don't tell Dr. Gaster about this one. Ok?"_

 _Papyrus continued pouting but he also started to look concerned. "…OK"_

 _"Thank you" Sans took the book from Papyrus lap and got up from the couch "We …. I think it's time we have some lunch"_

 _"SANS?"_

 _"Hm?"_

 _"DOES DAD …" Papyrus looked at the floor in front of the couch suddenly self conscious "DOES DAD NOT LIKE YOU?"_

 _"Papyrus…" Sans said holding the book close to his chest like armor "Dr. Gaster takes good care of us"_

 _Papyrus shook his head, his eyes still glued to the floor. "I DIDN'T ASK THAT. HE SAYS MEAN THINGS TO YOU. I HEARD HIM. WHY? HE'S YOUR DAD TOO, RIGHT?"_

 _"It's… different. I'm adopted. You know that" Sans held the book tighter._

 _"THAT MAKES HIM YOUR DAD TOO!" insisted Papyrus. "THE KIDS AT THE PLAYGROUND SAY THAT WHEN YOU ADOPT SOMEONE YOU BECOME THEIR PARENT. THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR YOU!"_

 _"Papyrus …. " Sans wrecked his brain for the right thing to say. He did not want to bad mouth Gaster to Papyrus. They loved each other. He did not want to be the one to tarnish their relationship. "You… You were the one who adopted me, remember?"_

 _Papyrus lifted his head. He frowned trying to remember. "I did?"_

 _"Yeah, and Dr. Gaster … your Dad … decided to let you do it because he loves you"_

 _"I'M YOUR DAD?!"_

 _"Well, no. You adopted me as your brother" Sans smiled and it was genuine. He loved remembering that moment when Papyrus had declared him his brother. His soul fell ten times fuller every time he did._

 _Papyrus thought about it some more then seemed to come to a decision._

 _"HE SHOULDN'T BE MEAN TO YOU. YOU'RE MY BROTHER!" He declared jumping off the couch and going over to Sans. He grabbed his left hand with both of his. "YOU'RE MY RESPON… RESPAN… RES"_

 _"Responsibility" Sans smiled at his little brother._

 _'YES!"_

 _"He's not mean to me. He just gets … frustrated sometimes"_

 _Papyrus looked ready to go to war for him. "I WILL TELL HIM NOT TO"_

 _This was no good. Sans didn't want to risk getting Papyrus into trouble. He put the book down on the living room table with his free hand. "Thank you but I rather you promise me something that will make me very happy"_

 _"UH, WHAT IS IT?"_

 _"Promise me that you will let me deal with Dr. Gaster. He's your dad and you should never talk back to your dad, because, well, he's your Dad and you love him right?"_

 _"YES, BUT..."_

 _"Please promise me"_

 _Papyrus looked rebellious but in the end he folded, "OK. I PROMISE"_

 _Sans smiled and hugged him for a long time. He didn't_

 _Was he really going to leave his little brother behind?_

 _._

 _.._

 _…_

 _…._

* * *

"SANS!" screamed Papyrus into his cell phone. He could hear him breathing but he wasn't saying anything. "SANSSSS!" He was in the bed of Asgore's truck going full speed down a road that was rarely used. It was more of a wide forest trail than a road realistically speaking. He had been so distracted by his phone suddenly ringing with Sans number on it that he had almost fallen off. It didn't help that Undyne was the one driving and being quite liberal about the definition of safe distances from trees and neck breaking speed in general.

Alphy's opened the truck's rear window. "Papyrus? What's wrong? Is that Sans on the phone?"

"YES! BUT HE'S NOT TALKING!" He said then he fell back on his butt again as Undyne sent the truck flying when she hit a small hill on the road. His cell phone almost bounced out of the bed and into the trees speeding by, but luckily it had bounced back into the bed and ended up in one of the far corners. Papyrus crawled desperately to recover it.

"Undyne! Be careful!" said Alphy's "You almost threw Papyrus off"

"We need to get there fast don't we?" Said the fish monster not easing up on the speed one bit "PAPYRUS! DON'T FALL OFF!" She commanded over her shoulder toward the truck's bed.

She then directed her attention to Alphys "Are we still going the right way?"

"Oh, um …" Alphys scrambled back to her laptop. Now she understood why Asgore regally declined going with them. Instead, it was agreed that he would stay behind and inform Toriel and Frisk of what was going on.

"Yes, yes, just continue down this road for another three miles. Then we're going to have to go on foot"

"Gotcha!" said Undyne and grabbed the wheel tighter. "We'll be there in not time"

Alphys looked at the laptop with renewed concern. The constant shaking of the truck kept making his laptop loose connection. The ominous blip of magic they had seen heading towards Sans signal kept appearing and disappearing. Now Sans signal was gone as well as her laptop tried to connect again. She couldn't tell where they were and hoped that the coordinates she recorded earlier were still the same. Her phone rang calling her attention. It was the number for the crew stationed at the Core. She was about to answer it when she remembered that Papyrus had Sans on the phone, maybe she could use that signal as a back up! She let the call go to voicemail praying that it was just the daily status report and not an emergency. She could hardly deal with another one. She turned around again to speak ask Papyrus for his phone but when she looked out the window, she beheld an unsettling sight.

Papyrus was now sitting with his back against the tail gate. His face was frozen with his teeth slightly apart. Small blue tears were streaming down his cheeks. His eyes were wide and unseeing. He was holding the phone next to his face with a grip that threatened to turn it to dust.

"Papyrus?" asked Alphys carefully "Papyrus, what's wrong?"

Papyrus didn't seem to hear her. Instead he moved his jaw several times before he finally talked back into the phone in a chocked, desperate whisper.

"Dad?"

* * *

Sans wanted to scream at the tall dark man. He wanted to curse his name. But all sound was stuck in his throat. Irrational fear commanded him to stay quiet, to not acknowledge the dead. He had seen Gaster die.

Didn't he?

The apparition moved towards him slowly, quietly, smiling the entire time. As he got closer, his features changed. Not expression wise, but in form. The smaller cracks in his head started to close. The flickering around his body eased and began to look more solid. The little lights that were his eyes grew larger and shone with recognition, with memories.

And with every crack healed on Gaster, Sans felt the pain of a new one in his body. With every gain of form, he felt his being dissipating. With every memory regained, he felt his soul painfully scrambling to leave his body.

When he was a mere few inches away from Sans, Gaster "knelt" on one knee. He tilted his head at the phone Sans had forgotten he was holding in front of him.

They both became aware of Papyrus voice coming from it calling Sans' name. Gaster reached out a bony hand and took the phone from Sans.

"no … wait" said Sans weakly still unable to move.

Gaster took the phone and listened to it. There was some road noise and then a loud bang as it hit something. There was some scrambling and then Papyrus getting back on the line.

"SANS! I'M SORRY, I DROPPED MY PHONE. SANS! PLEASE ANSWER ME!"

Gaster's eyes went wide. Papyrus! Yes! That was his son's name! He sounded so grown up. How long had it been?

"Papyrus" he practically purred into the phone. Was that his voice? How exciting! "This is your father"

It was like a shock of electricity through the phone, making Papyrus head jerk back by pure instinct. He didn't remember forgetting or maybe he forgot to remember. Images and information that shouldn't be flooded into him, the world shifted and suddenly he was no longer in a truck going down a mountain road at full speed. _He was back at the Core in a much younger body. There were alarms going off everywhere, everything was coated in red light. He saw himself running down a narrow corridor towards angry shouting._

 _A machine generated voice announced a lockdown. It warned to leave the Core before that happened. 2 minutes left._

 _He recognized the voices. It was his Dad and Sans fighting. He had never heard either of them sound so angry, but Sans voice had a high pitch to it that Papyrus had never heard before. It was desperate. Resentful._

 _Hateful._

 _He needed to stop this. They needed to get out of there._

 _He ran into the control room shouting their names. Telling them to stop. Begging them. Sans was closer to him while Gaster was next to the entrance to the balcony that overlook the core. The glow of the lava below gave him an eerie look. He looked insane. Papyrus barely registered that he was holding his side and dust was trickling from it. Sans turned his head towards him but Gaster ignored him continuing his fixation on his older brother. He was saying something in another language. Papyrus recognized the words, the words that made Sans so afraid._

 _The world tilted and blurred. Somewhere far away a voice announced a minute left before lockdown. He heard Sans shout his name and telling to leave before doubling over in pain as the second word was said._

 _Papyrus couldn't stand it anymore. He blanked out._

 _Then…_

 _Then…_

 _Something horrible happened._

.

..

…

….

* * *

He had forgotten all about it.

Tears. There were tears. He was crying.

 _"Papyrus? Papyrus what's wrong?"_ He heard Alphys ask.

"Dad?" he heard himself say.

"LEAVE HIM ALONE!" he heard Sans shout with that same voice he had heard him use back at the Core. Something hit the phone and the line went dead.

"NO … NO, NO, NO!" shouted Papyrus at his cell phone.

"WHAT'S GOING ON?!" shouted Alphys just before they were both thrown forward as Undyne hit the brakes sending the truck into a spinning stop.

"Ugh, Undyyyynneee" complained Alphys as she lay upside down in the passenger's seat. She was glad that her kind of monster had very though skin and bones.

"Oh no! Are you ok?!" asked Undyne "Sorry! the road ended much sooner than I expected" she said motioning to the cliff face they had almost gone over. She reached over and helped Alphys back unto her feet. "What was all the shouting about?"

"I don't know!" said Alphys "Papyrus said something about his dad?"

Undyne mouthed the word "Dad" confused and looked over to the truck's bed just in time to see Papyrus throwing the phone away and leaping over its side and running into the forest at full speed.

"PAPYRUS!" she called after him.

"I HAVE TO STOP HIM!" she heard him shout before disappearing behind some trees.

Undyne and Alphys exchanged glances. Alphys nodded. "Go. I can't keep up. Keep your phone on"

Undyne leaned over and kissed her. Then she leaped over the hood of the car as she summoned one of her spears. Whatever was causing all this grief to the brothers was in a lot of trouble, she would make sure of it.

Alphys watched go then a beep from her phone called her attention. There were several voicemails. "What IS going on today?" she muttered to herself.

* * *

Papyrus ran with all his might. He didn't even know if he was going in the right direction but he couldn't stop himself. He leapt over fallen trees and rocks trying to concentrate on the pull of blue magic being used. He had to get there in time, he just had to. He wouldn't let Sans pay for his mistake.

* * *

Gaster glared at his broken right hand then at Sans, who's left eye was already losing glow. How dare he use a bone attack against him. Out of the corner of his eye he saw a new set of magic bones popping out of the ground. He leaped backwards putting some distance between himself and his target. He easily avoided Sans' wild attacks. He was impressed that the small skeleton had managed one attack, let alone three in his condition. He must've been practicing in his absence. Gaster waved his left hand making bones materialize in mid air and sent them flying towards Sans (magic ahhh, it felt so good to be using magic again), they all hit the ground around him, barely missing him.

Sans knew he was being toyed with and that the next attack wouldn't miss. He raised his left hand but stopped and his expression changed to that of utter confusion. Gaster had no soul.

"what … what are you?" He asked unable to hide the tremble in his voice.

Gaster rolled his shoulders back and stood up straight. Ooooh , legs, feet. Those were nice. He was feeling better than ever. All this blue magic in the air was positively invigorating.

"I am Dr. W.D. Gaster" he mocked. "Have you really forgotten your very first lesson?"

Sans grunted. It was becoming more and more difficult to stay focused. "what are … how … how can you be here? YOU DIED!"

There was a moment of silence. "Well I guess I technically did" conceded Gaster with a sour smile. "I believe that the magic nature of the Core and the fact that a monster is basically made almost entirely of magic have something to do with it." He shook his head realizing he was rambling "It's all rather fascinating and I have theories that I'm looking forward to researching once I get back my property"

He took a step forward, making Sans flinch. "[SANS]"

"stop it…"

Gaster's smile grew wider. "C'mon, do you really want to stay here? You no longer have a purpose." He took another step closer. "I can feel it, you know… The stolen soul inside of you is speaking to me. It's telling me of your despair. You don't _want_ to be here"

Sans hands clawed at the grass. "shut … up"

"[SANS] , [SAAANNSSSS]" he practically sang "it's time to pay for your sins. time to give up what you stole "

Sans clamped his hands to the sides of his head. He refused to cry in front of this monster "SHUT UP!"

His pain was so delicious. He never thought of himself of the sadistic type but with him it was soooo easy. He wanted him to experience at least a small portion of what he suffered in the void. Not knowing who he was, being aware of everything and yet being nothing at all, but as much he wished he could torture his prey for far longer, Gaster could feel his own power draining. The Core could only take him so far. He needed to finish this now. It was a shame, really.

He looked at his right hand. It was still broken, his pinky and ring finger hung at an odd angle. It would take a while for his magic to fix it properly. Well, it was a good thing that he had _other_ hands.

He materialized five detached black hands. A trick he had learned in the void once his consciousness had started to return. In the void, having no body meant having no body limitations. This was a huge power drain, but he wanted to be able to feel his target disintegrate right under him. He commanded the hands to grab Sans arms and legs and forced him to lay spread eagle on the ground. The fifth hand clamped over his mouth, stifling his protests.

"Now, thief" He towered over Sans "hear my words"

"[SANS]"

Sans struggled against his bonds but he knew there was no escape. His thought of Papyrus and his friends. They would never know what happened to him.

[BONAM]

Pain. "i'm sorry" he thought.

[NOCTEM]

So much pain. "i'm sorry i was a lie"

[DULCIS]

The pain was replaced by a terrifying feeling of disconnection. He could no longer feel his body. His consciousness was slipping away. His being breaking apart becoming nothing.

"i'm sorry for being so weak"

He closed his eyes.

[P… off!

"LET GO OF MY BROTHER!"

Gaster was suddenly sent flying as a barrage of bones hit him from the left breaking the voice command chain. The hands holding Sans down disappeared. Papyrus ran over to his brother and spread his arms to his sides. New bones materialized in between Gaster and the brothers as a barrier.

"YOU … YOU STAY AWAY!" He declared. He was shaking. It was HIM. It was his father.

Gaster was equally flabbergasted. That was his son. He would recognize him anywhere. When did he get so tall? Last time he saw him … last time ….

 _Last time…_

 _So much time lost._

"Papyrus, you don't understand…"

Papyrus reeled at hearing his father's voice. He couldn't believe this was happening.

"NO! YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND. I WON'T LET YOU HURT HIM! I … I DON'T WANT TO HURT YOU …"

Gaster got up slowly. His son didn't want to hurt him. Well that was good news. He just needed to understand.

"Stand down Papyrus" he said coldly.

"NO! PROMISE FIRST!"

"PAPYRUS" he shouted making the tall skeleton flinch. "STAND D… ugh"

Suddenly all strength left his body. He fell unto his knees, he looked at his hands. They were melting. "No!" The Core was powering down. His power suddenly cut off. He had to get back. Fast.

"You're making a grave mistake, my son" he murmured as he phased away.

"D… DAD?" Papyrus said dropping the bone barrier. He ran to where Gaster had been and looked into the trees but found no sign of him. He turned around and ran towards Sans. He picked up his body and held it close.

"SANS?" he called but his brother was completely unresponsive. "SANS, PLEASE WAKE UP…" He was cold to the touch and if it hadn't been for Papyrus being able to still sense a living soul inside of him, he would've thought him dead. He hugged him burying his face in Sans' chest.

"I'M SORRY. I'M SO SORRY"


	8. Notes

Chapter Eight – Notes

Author notes: This story is currently planned to be 11 chapters long. May be one less or one more depending on how I want to pace it. Thank you for all the kind reviews and I hope you like this chapter, from which I actually cut a piece out because it was just getting too long! I'm tired. Anyhow, enjoy!

* * *

Toriel sat in front of her already cold tea. She didn't know what to do with herself. She felt utterly useless and it didn't help that she didn't know the full story. All she knew was that her dear skeleton family had an altercation of some kind that morning and that at some point later in the day Sans had been attacked by some unknown magical entity. Undyne, Alphys and even Asgore had tried to fill in some of the details but it had all come out disjointed in the midst of everyone trying to help out.

 _Undyne had found Papyrus holding Sans' body in fierce hug, mere moments after the attack had ended. At first, he hadn't even recognized her in his distress and almost attacked her until she kicked him in the head._

 _"Gently" she had clarified._

 _After that, she was able to help him get Sans back to the truck, where Alphys tried her best to assess his condition. They drove back as fast as they could to the brothers' home. The entire time Papyrus was barely talking, much less answering questions. All he did was hold on to Sans apologizing for something._

 _When they had gotten there, it had taken another round of convincing and reassuring for Papyrus to finally let them lay Sans body on his own bed. Undyne then took on the task of fetching things and organizing a small group of monsters and humans to keep an eye for the creature that attacked Sans. Papyrus was of little help as he seemed afraid to leave his brother's side. He sat in quiet panic, sometimes inspecting the dark corners of the room, looking and listening for something._

 _Alphys' wasn't doing all that much better. The female lizard was frantic. Not only something horrible had happened to two of her friends, she was also dealing with the news that the Core was malfunctioning. She had had to initiate an emergency shut down and a reset, something that hadn't happened in decades. Her phone wouldn't stop vibrating and had to divide her attention between handling the Underground crew and setting up equipment in Sans' room._

 _Luckily, Toriel had arrived soon after having asked Asgore to take care of Frisk for a while. Toriel knew that her child wouldn't accept staying away while her adopted uncles if they suspected they were in some kind of trouble. Toriel did not want to hide anything from her child, but she hoped that she could at least delay telling them for a little bit, at least until she got a chance to concentrate on helping Sans._

 _And tried to help she did, but whatever was causing Sans' current ailment was beyond her healing abilities. The best she could do was work on the injury on his leg, and even that was proving to be taxing. Normally, a monster's magical body could mend most non-life threatening injuries. Magic food helped expedite the process. However, something was wrong with Sans' magic. It … was simply not there anymore. There was no trace of it, at least not in a way that Alphys' instruments could detect. It was confounding. There simply was no way for a monster to exist without magic. It was like expecting a human to live without their blood._

 _"I… I don't understand" had said Alphys reading her instruments for the fourth or fifth time. "If I didn't know any better…" she muttered._

 _"What is it dear?" asked Toriel looking at the display that Alphys was looking at and not making any sense of it. Papyrus looked up suddenly alert to what she was saying._

 _"I … I… I can't. I'm not sure …" Alphys said with a hand on her snout. Toriel saw tears forming at the corners of her eyes. She avoided looking towards Papyrus. Toriel felt the weight of dread press down on her chest._

 _"He's fallen" said Papyrus in an emotionless, unrecognizable voice. He got up from the edge of the bed. "He got what he wanted"._

 _"No!" argued Alphys " Papyrus, What do … do you mean?"_

 _"Who would want this?!" asked Toriel_

 _Papyrus ignored them both and walked out of the room. Toriel gasped. She had never seen the tall skeleton act like this. She turned to face Alphys who had her face buried in her hands._

 _"Alphys! Is he right?" She chocked on the words. "Is … is Sans fallen?"_

 _"I… don't know" Alphys cried "I really don't know"_

 _It took Toriel a while to calm Alphys down enough for her to try to explain. The poor scientist was at the end of her rope. Alphys had never seen anything like the condition Sans was in._

 _"His HP… is still at one" she said. Toriel exhaled in relief. Sure it was incredibly low HP count for a fully grown monster, but at least with Sans it meant that he was a full health._

 _"And his soul is intact" Alphys continued "but it's like …." She spread her hands apart "It's like it's not part of him"_

 _"Not part of him?" Toriel looked over to Sans. He looked to be in a deep sleep. His breathing was very slow and weak. His bones were cold to the touch and had an ashen look to them. Even his usual smile was gone. She couldn't stand the thought that she would never get to talk to him again, to laugh together. She held back a sob._

 _"It … it should be impossible" sighed Alphys "but that's the only explanation I can … can come up with right now. He's, he's not fallen! For a monster, being fallen means that their soul is slowly fading away. In Sans' case, his soul is fine but it's no longer attached to his body. He's alive because … because … of proximity…"_

 _Visions of souls in glass cases came to Toriel. "His soul is being contained within his body but it's not part of it" Toriel repeated quietly not wanting to think about those times, those children souls. "Like the six souls were contained back in the castle? Are you saying that he's no different than a glass case right now?"_

 _"No! … Yes…" Alphys looked away ashamed. "All I know that if we don't find a way to reconnect his soul to his body… it will waste away"_

 _Toriel looked at her horrified. She stroked Sans's cheek. What kind of horrible monster had done this to her friend? How could she possibly help him?_

 _"I'm sorry Alphys. My tone was inexcusable. You only did what my ex-husband asked you to do" said Toriel keeping her eyes on Sans._

 _Alphys blushed and wrung her hands. She had wanted to speak to the former queen about those times for a while now but never found the right time. This certainly wasn't the right time. She pinched the bridge of her snout and sat down on her tail. She was so exhausted. Toriel noticed this and got up._

 _"You need to eat something and get some rest. I'll make arrangements" she said smiling softly at the scientist._

 _"Oh, no, no, that's ok"_

 _"Please let me" insisted Toriel heading for the door._

 _"Oh … ok"_

 _Out in the hallway, Toriel ran into Undyne coming back with some of Alphys' things in a bag, obviously way more aware than anyone else of her girlfriend's needs. Toriel greeted her and gave her thanks for everything she had done so far. Undyne had been a little surprised but returned Toriel's smile all the same._

* * *

Toriel found Papyrus sitting on the big couch in the living room. She tried to get Papyrus to speak to her and even to get him to drink and eat some warm broth and bread, without much success. Neighbors and friends showed up soon after, the news of something bad happening to the brothers spreading like wildfire. Everybody had good intentions and tried to help in their own ways. Food was brought in from the restaurant where Papyrus worked at. Papyrus ignored everyone and it took all of Toriel's diplomatic skills to thank everyone on his behalf and to gently ask people to let him be.

A little before six, Asgore arrived with Frisk. The moment they had been through the door, Frisk had run in and sat next to Papyrus. They poked him a couple of times but when they got no response, they ran over to Toriel confused. They asked where Sans was.

"He's sick, dear child" explained Toriel "He's sleeping right now. Papyrus is very worried about him. It's best not to bother him right now"

Frisk looked over to where Sans bedroom was then over to Papyrus. "Why isn't he with Sans?" they signed.

Toriel's head came up with several different answers from "He just wants to let him sleep" to "Alphys and Undyne are looking after him right now" but she let her heart answer "I don't know, my child"

Frisk then asked if it was ok for them to just sit with the skeleton. Toriel looked doubtful but she agreed as long as Papyrus didn't mind. The child nodded and climbed onto the couch determined to keep her friend's company.

.

..

…

Papyrus stared.

He was barely aware of the people that had filled their small Overland home with their coming and going. Friends, family even strangers said many things to him. Their voices were gentle, or at least they tried to be. Sometimes there had been touch. Someone patted his shoulder; someone else put something warm in his hands. A blanket found its way around his shoulders, he thought. Maybe he imagined all of it.

He couldn't remember anything the voices said except for one thing: They all asked if he was ok.

He could barely remember the last time he had been ok. His head was full of so many loud and conflicting thoughts. He wanted to cry but he also wanted to be angry. He wished he could feel relief but guilt overwhelmed him. He wanted to blame but he also wanted to forgive.

He wanted to be forgiven … but also damned.

….

Of course. He. Wasn't. Ok.

Why did people ask that anyway? Wouldn't it be obvious? How could he _possibly_ be ok? Did they ask so they could feel better themselves? So _they_ wouldn't have to worry?

Why?

Why?

 _Why was he such a horrible monster?_

 _…Such a horrible brother?_

Papyrus stared.

He stared at a sock, a sock covered in notes on a mantel across the room from him. It was pretty much a family heirloom at this point.

It had started innocently enough. Sans had left a dirty sock on the floor of their old home living room and Papyrus had put a sticky note on it reminding him to put it away. Sans' response had been to add another sticky note to it with one of his usual sarcastic remarks regarding the state of the sock and why there was no need to move it. This caused Papyrus to leave another note and Sans responded to that, and so on and so on, it had escalated to the point that unless you were familiar with the story, you wouldn't even realize there was sock under the copious amount of notes.

It was just something they did together and despite the apparent tone of the notes, it was something they mutually enjoyed. It was playful jabbing. Papyrus couldn't even recall them ever discussing the sock face to face with his brother. They just left notes to each other. It had been a game.

So Papyrus stared.

He took note of the color of each piece of paper, which ones were folded at the edges, their sizes, which ones had his writing. He counted them from the top down, did a mental inventory and then counted them again from the bottom up, expecting them to be final number to be different.

 _Hoping_ that it was different.

He remembered reading that you couldn't count or read in dreams because that part of your brain shut down when you slept (incredibly inefficient in Papyrus personal opinion), and that if you dreamt yourself counting or reading something, it was just your brain tricking you into _thinking_ that you counted or read it. And that if you did it enough times during a dream, the numbers or letters would stop making sense and your brain would snap awake.

So he stared.

And counted.

Because once this was over. Once this stopped being a dream. THEN he could be ok. Everything would be ok.

 _All of this had to be a dream._

.

.

…

He felt a small hand on his. He looked at it for a moment before he registered that it belonged to Frisk. He looked up and saw the child looking at him with worry etched on every feature of their young face. When did they get there? How late was it?

"FRISK" he said in a voice he hardly recognized as his own. He opened his mouth to say Hi, to ask all the polite questions that a good host should ask but he couldn't. Saying the child's name was all he could manage. He became afraid that if he said anything else, it would come out all wrong.

The child smiled at him regardless. At first they only leaned their head against his shoulder. Slowly, Papyrus raised his right arm and put it around their shoulders and patted their head as a thank you. Frisk held their hands on their lap for a moment uncertain, then turn towards the skeleton and made them lean over so they could give them a long, proper hug. Papyrus was startled at first then he returned the hug finally accepting that it wasn't a dream.

He cried long and hard.

* * *

Toriel looked up when she heard Papyrus crying. She peeked out from the kitchen where she and Asgore had busied themselves making tea and some snacks for everybody. She was about to step out to comfort the skeleton and check on her child when she was stopped by a paw on her shoulder. Asgore nodded towards Frisk who despite crying themselves, they seemed to be perfectly in control of the situation. She sighed and went back into the kitchen convinced that she needed to give the two some alone time.

Asgore immediately went back to making tea. He and Toriel had been on friendlier speaking terms since their Underground days but their conversations were almost always short and extremely polite, revolving mainly around Frisk and the school. Neither of them held any delusions about things going back to the way they were between them but at least things were not actively aggressive anymore.

Toriel could tell that Asgore felt as lost as she did. He always obsessed over small tasks when he was worried about something, preferring to keep his paws and mind busy. Otherwise he would go into a panic. It was this detail oriented thinking that kept him from being afraid of the big picture.

He put a fresh cut of tea in front of Toriel. It had to been the third or fourth cup he had offered. She wasn't keeping count. His tea was delicious as always, but enough was enough. She motioned for him to stop and sit down across the table from her.

"Alphys says that she doesn't know how to help Sans" she stated not looking at Asgore.

"Give her time. She will figure it out" He said fiddling with his cup.

Toriel looked at him suddenly mad. She couldn't help it. He sounded … so dismissive.

"She compared his situation to being a soul trapped in a glass container" she tried to but couldn't hide the growl in her voice.

Asgore blinked at her. He rolled his shoulders back and straightened his back. He put his hands palm down in front of him on the table. His face was somber. "I see"

It was an old habit, a kingly way of assuming or at least recognizing, responsibility.

"Asgore" Toriel rolled her eyes, in a way more at herself from bringing this up than at him "I wish I would get an actual emotional response from you than an automatic guilty one"

Asgore covered one paw with the other. "Tori… I can never…"

"I can't either" she interrupted. She took a deep breath. "But we can try to move on because our friends … Frisk, need us now"

"We will never meet the light if we only recognize the dark" quoted Asgore from one of Toriel's favorite books. She smiled in spite of herself.

"Tori … I'm worried too" he continued. "Sans and I are friends as well"

Toriel nodded. It had come to a surprise to her to learn that Asgore had actually known Sans for far longer than she had. Sans had called it "a working relationship". Neither of them seemed too willing to talk about what this "working relationship" entailed in the past but nowadays Asgore and Sans got along remarkably well, even if the skeleton's humor went over former King's head more often than not. Several times Toriel had seen them talking quietly outside the school. She could only imagine the secrets those two shared.

"I may not be King anymore, but if there is something out there attacking monster, maybe even human souls, I feel it's my responsibility to help put an end to it" Asgore paws clasped together "Alphys told me that it seemed to target Sans in particular, but that may have only been because he was the only monster around in that area"

"I DON'T THINK HE WILL ATTACK ANYONE ELSE"

Toriel and Asgore looked over to the entrance to the kitchen where Papyrus stood. His right hand was on the doorway while he held Frisk's hand with the other. His face had a small blue hue to it. His eyes were heavy from crying and the need to sleep but still alert.

"You know who the creature is?" asked Toriel surprised.

"Y … YES" his gaze dropped to the floor, his hold on Frisk's hand tightened.

"Papyrus?" prompted Asgore.

"I … I THINK IT'S MY FATHER. DR. W.D. GASTER"

* * *

 _Papyrus woke up to the sound of quiet footsteps going down the stairs. He had been too excited to go to bed and now he was too excited to keep sleeping. He looked over to Sans bed and was not overly surprised to see it empty. It did make him very, very curious._

 _He got up and opened the door to their bedroom just in time to see the front door close._

 _"HE'S GOING OUTSIDE AGAIN" he thought. He rushed back in to get dressed. He really wanted to know what Sans was doing going outside after bedtime. Maybe he was getting a surprise ready for when father came home the next day. If that was the case, he really wanted to be part of it. Maybe it would help Sans and Gaster get along better. That would be the best of gifts!_

 _He followed Sans tracks in the snow and was a little disappointed when he realized that they just went to the back of the house. He had half hoped that they led into the forest to a secret hideout. That would certainly be more adventurous! Still, that wasn't enough of a reason to give up on his quest to find out what Sans was up to._

 _He tiptoed up to the door to the lab. He tilted his head to the side wondering what Sans was doing at his father's office. He had only been there a couple of times that he could remember and Sans only went there when Gaster asked him to. It wasn't a very exciting place. In fact, it was a bit scary. He wasn't a baby bones anymore though! If Sans wasn't afraid of going in there by himself, then so could he!_

 _He reached for the doorknob and yelped when the door opened before he reached it. Sans was looking at him in a panic that soon evolved into relief that then resolved into annoyance._

 _"Papyrus!" he hissed "What ARE YOU DOING HERE?"_

 _Papyrus looked at him in quiet fascination. He didn't think his brother could emote that much in such a short amount of time. Then he remembered that he had a question to answer "I'M FOLLOWING YOU"_

 _Sans let out a long breath then he smiled tiredly. "Ok, why don't you go back to bed? I won't be long"_

 _"WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THERE?"_

 _"I'm … I'm cleaning up"_

 _"I'LL HELP!"_

 _"No. I'm almost done and you aren't supposed to be up this late"_

 _"NEITHER ARE YOU!" Papyrus crossed his arms over his chest._

 _"Paps, I can stay as late as I want" argued Sans "I'm not a baby bones like you!"_

 _"NUH HUH!" Papyrus stomped his feet._

 _"Nah huh!"_

 _"I WANNA HELP!" yelled Papyrus. In the quiet of the night, his little voice echoed loudly in between the neighboring houses._

 _Sans looked around nervously and held a hand in front of him in surrender._

 _"Ok, ok, you can come in" he said stepping aside. "Just … just be quiet, ok?"_

 _"OK!"_

 _Papyrus took a long, sweeping look around the lab as soon as he was in. Yep, the place was still as awful as ever. He jumped around here and there looking at everything and finding everything absolutely boring. He stifled a yawn and turned on one foot to see what his brother was doing. He saw him crouched in front of a drawer in the far end of the room, holding a piece of paper. Remembering to be quiet, he sneaked up for a better look._

 _"THAT'S THE PUZZLE I SOLVED" he said happily._

 _"Yeah" said Sans entering the last part of the sequence. His hand was shaking. Papyrus found this rather odd._

 _Papyrus thought of a dozen follow up questions but was interrupted from his train of thought when the drawer made a clicking noise and slid open. Treasure?_

 _No._

 _More papers. Papyrus snorted disappointed._

 _Sans started riffling through the papers. Pulling some of them out, giving them a quick read then immediately putting them back in._

 _"SANS?"_

 _"Hm?"_

 _"What are those papers about? Are they stories?" asked Papyrus bouncing back and forth on his heels._

 _"No …" answered Sans distractedly suddenly finding one particular set of papers very interesting. He sat next to the drawer and hunched over them. There were drawings on them but nothing that Papyrus could recognize. Papyrus sat on the floor and leaned back on the cabinet. He was trying to be good and keep quiet but this place was sooooooo booooring. He looked into the drawer and noticed something against the back of it that didn't look like the other papers. He pulled it out._

 _"OH! A BOOK!" he said looking at the small leather journal in his hands. He eagerly opened it. "PAPYRUS KEEPER PROJECT" he read out loud. "IT'S MY NAME! AND THIS IS DADDY'S HANDWRITTING!"_

 _Sans looked up from what he had been reading and reached for the journal. "Can I see that?"_

 _"NO! YOU HAVE YOUR OWN STUFF TO READ!" Papyrus said keeping the journal away._

 _"C'mon Paps, please? I think that's what I was looking for" said Sans._

 _"YOU CAN HAVE IT WHEN I'M DONE WITH IT" declared Papyrus getting up with a giggle and opening the journal at a random page. "SANS TRIAL NUMBER 7 …" He read out loud "WAS BORN TODAY"_

 _"IT'S LIKE A BABY BOOK! Papyrus beamed "FOR YOU!"_

 _"Papyrus, give it here!" Sans launched for the journal but Papyrus dodged him easily. He laughed as he ran away just enough to give himself another chance to reading another entry at random._

 _"SANS TRIAL NUMBER 8 … OPENED HIS EYES TODAY"he read and frowned a little "I WONDER WHAT HE MEANS BY THOSE NUMBERS? … HEY! NO! MINE!" He dodged just in time to avoid his brother's attempts to get the journal._

 _"NYE HE HE HE HEHE" He taunted running around the lab._

 _"Papyrus!" warned Sans trying his best to not get upset at his brother._

 _"NYE!" Papyrus stopped right besides a covered machine. He quickly opened the book again. "SANS TRIAL NUMBER 8 DIED …" He stopped realizing what he just read. "UM … DIED TODAY"_

 _Papyrus read the rest of it in silence, his eyes becoming wide. Sans approached him carefully._

 _"I don't think you should be reading that" he said gently taking the journal away from his younger brother._

 _"WHAT IS THAT BOOK ABOUT?" Papyrus looked at the journal as if he expected it to grow fangs and launch at him. "WHY IS YOUR NAME IN THERE? WHY DOES IT SAY YOU DIED?"_

 _"It's just … nonsense" said Sans. He read the passage that Papyrus had read then he read a couple of more pages. His expression became grimmer as he went on._

 _"NO! STOP BEING LIKE THIS!" Papyrus yelled pushing Sans in the arm. "YOU ALWAYS SAY ITS "NONSENSE" WHEN YOU DON'T WANT TO TELL ME WHAT'S BUGGING YOU"_

 _Sans looked at him. His eyes were incredibly sad and regretful._

 _"PLEASE TELL ME!" insisted Papyrus sniffling "PLEASE … "_

 _"I don't know … why it says that" said Sans finally. He spread his arms "I'm not dead am I?"_

 _"NO…" said Papyrus using his sleeve to clear the tears threatening to spill from his eyes. He then felt a pull on his free arm and was caught in a full bear hug._

 _"Whatever this book says" he heard Sans say "it doesn't change how I feel about you, ok?"_

 _Papyrus nodded and returned the hug._

 _They then read the journal. Every single page, until dawn._

 _Papyrus cried long and hard._


	9. Core Meanings

Chapter 9 – "Core Meaning"

Author notes: A much shorter chapter compared to the previous ones but this was more of a "bridge" chapter and it felt like I was rambling too much. Sorry. The "final confrontation" starts with the next chapter and ends in chapter 11th.

"Your father?" asked Toriel confused. Papyrus nodded sadly. Toriel exchanged glances with both Asgore and Frisk who looked as lost as she felt. She motioned the skeleton and her child to come over and sit with them. "Come dears. Would you like some pie? Perhaps some tea?"

Papyrus shook his head but Frisk nodded theirs. Toriel got up to fetch them a slice. Asgore leaned forward on the table.

"I wasn't aware that your father was still alive" he said apologetically. "I just assumed since your brother never…"

"HE ISN'T" corrected Papyrus then frowned at his own statement "I MEAN … HE DIED A LONG TIME AGO" The frown got even deeper. "I… WE … THOUGHT HE DID"

Toriel brought over a slice of pie for Frisk along with glasses of milk for both them and Papyrus. She was determined to get some food into the skeleton before the end of the day. He looked like he was wasting away. Practically skin and bones …. Then she stopped and berated herself internally for the chuckle forming in the back of her throat. He would've loved that.

Frisk looked at the pie hungrily but refrained from digging in. Instead they looked at the skeleton and the pie-less spot in front of them. Papyrus waved them on and made a point to take a sip of his milk to further encourage them. Frisk smiled at his friend and put a big spoonful of pie into their mouth making a happy sound.

The three adults watched the child eat in silence. Their happiness in that simple act infectious, Papyrus couldn't help but feel a little better or at least a little calmer. When they were nearly finished they took the last big spoonful of pie and fed it to the Papyrus. As the skeleton chewed on the sweet confection, the child patted their left hand.

Papyrus smiled gratefully. His head hurt and he felt a bit feverish. He guessed that's what having a fever felt like, since he couldn't remember if he ever had one before. Then again, there were a lot of things he didn't remember before weren't there?

It was surprisingly exhausting. Having all these new thoughts come in randomly. It wasn't like he could remember things at will. He tried to remember what shows he used to watch when he was a kid and came up blank. He couldn't even remember if he watched television. Instead, he could remember where every piece of furniture was in his father's old lab. The texture of his hands. The humming he used when he put him to sleep.

Every. Single. Step. to the solution to that cursed puzzle.

If he hadn't solved that puzzle, maybe Sans wouldn't have been able to either. They would've never found that journal and they would've been able to carry on as normal.

And perhaps his father would not have died the way he did.

And perhaps their memories would not have been … forgotten? … erased? …

…

Except…

Sans would still be unhappy.

Worse…

His brother would be the one dead.

Gone.

Forgotten.

Papyrus didn't know how or why this was all happening now. However, he did know one thing for sure. He would find a way to fix this. Alphys had said that his brother wasn't fallen and despite his shameful display before, he believed her. He made a mental note to apologize properly to her as soon as possible.

"TORIEL?" he asked "WOULD YOU MIND GETTING UNDYNE AND ALPHYS? I HAVE A LOT TO TELL YOU GUYS"

* * *

Papyrus told them everything he could remember about Gaster about how he and Sans were raised. It was disjointed and he had to do a lot of backtracking as details came into his head. Everybody tried to keep up with him but it was obvious that they were having trouble understanding how such a huge chunk of Papyrus' life had just plain disappeared.

Alphys' couldn't help herself. She was extremely curious. She had never known (at least she didn't think she had ever known) who the actual creator of the Core had been. The information had just been missing from all records. She led the group in follow up questions. Now and then she would feel Undyne squeeze her shoulder gently warning her when she got a little too excited or insensitive about her line of questioning.

Then Papyrus told them about the night they found the journal. How he had been the one to solve the puzzle lock in the lab. About how Sans found out that he wasn't the first Sans but the 11th.

"WE FLIPPED THROUGH EVERY PAGE OF DAD'S JOURNAL" said Papyrus "SOMETIMES SANS TRIED TO GO TOO FAST FOR ME TO READ. DAD DESCRIBED EVERYTHING IN DETAIL. IT WAS HORRIBLE. THE … THE… PREVIOUS … THE FIRST ONES WERE MADE OUT OF BONES DAD HAD FOUND IN DIFERENT PARTS OF THE UNDERGROUND. IT SEEMS THAT HUMANS WILL THROW ANYTHING DOWN THE WATERFALLS"

He looked at his gloved hands momentarily unable to continue. Alphys' cellphone started vibrating in her sweater pocket. She slid the screen bar to ignore without looking at the screen.

"HE BELIEVED THAT BECAUSE THEY WERE FORMER HUMAN BONES, SOME TRACES OF THE SOUL WOULD REMAIN IN THEM. HE … MANAGED TO GROW NEW BODIES OUT OF THEM USING THIS MACHINE HE CREATED … BUT … THE FIRST FEW DIDN'T EVEN WAKE UP AND DISINTEGRATED BETWEEN MINUTES. … THE ONES THAT DID SURVIVE ACTED LIKE THEY REMEMBERED BEING ALIVE BEFORE … DAD WROTE THAT THEY WOULD BANG ON THE GLASS AND OPENED THEIR MOUTHS AS IF THEY WERE … SCREAMING. SOMETIMES THEY DIED ON THEIR OWN. SOMETIMES DAD … TERMINATED THEM"

(Ignore)

Papyrus closed his eyes and leaned back on the chair.

"How … how was this Sans … um … um… your Sans …. I mean, How was Sans different?" she asked.

Papyrus ran his hand over his mouth and nose before continuing. He looked like he was trying to get a better grasp on a memory he rather forget.

"SANS WAS CREATED FROM FRAGMENTS OF MY DAD'S BONES" he said finally "HE ALSO DECIDED TO TRANSFER PART OF HIS SOUL TO HIM"

"PART of his SOUL?" asked Alphys. Her eyes were big and round. Toriel and Asgore exchanged glances. "HOW?"

(Ignore)

"I DON'T KNOW … "continued Papyrus "WHEN HE STARTED … WORK ON SANS… DAD SWITCHED LANGUAGES IN THE JOURNAL. EVERYTHING WAS WRITTEN IN HANDS AFTER THAT"

"H ..hands?" Alphys was practically bouncing on her seat.

(Ignore)

"It's an ancient language" said Asgore making everybody's heads turn to him. "Spoken mainly by skeleton monsters, I didn't know it was still being used. Some believed it had some magical powers on its own because it was derived from human speech. My father knew a few phrases but I'm sure they were harmless"

Papyrus looked at surprised as everyone else. He had never heard of that before and felt a little embarrassed that he didn't know. He shook his head in attempt to clear it. He had to finish his story. "DAD AND SANS SPOKE IT TO EACH OTHER" he continued "I ONLY LEARNED A LITTLE BIT FROM DAD LATER ON AND SANS ONLY TAUGHT ME A FEW WORDS, ESPECIALLY THE FUNNY SOUNDING ONES"

He smiled softly at the memory of the two of them giggling over the hands word for "butt"

"I COULD TELL THAT SANS WAS ONLY TRANSLATING SOME PARTS OF THE HANDS WRITING IN THE JOURNAL. HE WOULD READ LARGE PARTS IN SILENCE. … I … I REMEMBER BEING SO MAD AT HIM FOR DOING THAT. I WAS SO SCARED FOR HIM. I CRIED AND CRIED AND HE KEPT TELLING ME IT WAS JUST BORING STUFF. THEN … HE REACHED A PAGE THAT ONLY HAD FOUR WORDS IN IT"

(Ignore!)

"HE STARTED SHAKING AND HIS EYES WENT DARK WHEN HE READ THOSE WORDS. HE THREW THE JOURNAL AS FAR AS HE COULD AND WOULDN'T TALK TO ME. I WENT TO GRAB THE JOURNAL AND TRIED TO READ THE WORDS BUT I COULDN'T" Papyrus wiped a couple of tears from the corners of his eyes "I SAT NEXT TO HIM AND I COULD TELL THAT HE WAS CRYING EVEN THOUGH HE HAD COVERED HIS FACE WITH HIS ARMS. I TOLD HIM THAT I WAS SORRY I MADE HIM READ THE JOURNAL AND THAT HE COULD SLEEP IN MY BED IF HE WANTED TO. THAT I WOULD THROW AWAY THE JOURNAL AND THAT I WOULD TELL DAD THAT I DID IT SO HE WOULDN'T GET IN TROUBLE"

"HE STOPPED CRYING. I REMEMBER HIM HAVING THIS LOOK ON HIS FACE … I CAN'T DESCRIBE IT … I DON'T KNOW WHAT IT WAS … MAYBE RESIGNATION?. HE TOLD ME TO NOT DO THAT. THAT WE WOULD PUT THE JOURNAL BACK WHERE WE FOUND IT AND NEVER SPEAK OF IT AGAIN. I DIDN'T KNOW WHAT TO THINK BUT I DIDN'T WANT TO MAKE HIM CRY AGAIN, SO I AGREED. I PUT EVERYTHING AWAY AS NEATLY AS I COULD. AFTERWARDS SANS RESET THE PUZZLE ON THE CABINET AND WE BOTH WENT BACK HOME"

(Ignore)

* * *

Everyone in the tiny kitchen was silent. It would be impossible to describe the feeling of the room after he told his group of friends what little coherent memories he had regained so far, but Papyrus tried anyway. It was better than dwelling on the feelings swirling around in his soul.

There was confusion. He could feel that from everyone but specially Toriel and Asgore. They would've been the ones to have known his father while he was alive, yet they did not have any memories of him. They remembered the Core being built and there being problems, but details were missing. Like names and meetings. Everything was reduced to mismatched shapes and sounds, words on the tip of your tongue, faces without features.

There was also Worry. For his brother, for him, maybe even themselves. Frisk's face was red and they held onto their mom in a fierce hug as they sat on her lap. Papyrus had really wanted to spare them hearing this but they were a child of determination. They would not be left in the dark.

Brewing under everything was Anger. Primarily from Undyne. He expected it from his protective friend but Papyrus was surprised to see it dancing on everybody's faces. Papyrus had misjudged how protective everyone was of them.

Finally, there was Fear. Fear of the unknown, of being helpless. Papyrus could only give them a tiny portion of the story. A hint of a clue. He was sure Sans could explain everything much better. If he were awake.

"This journal …" said Alphys "Where is it now?"

"I IMAGINE ITS STILL BACK AT THE LAB BACK HOME" said Papyrus thoughtfully "I DON'T THINK DAD EVER FOUND OUT WE READ IT. HE NEVER SAID ANYTHING ABOUT IT"

"THAT I REMEMBER" he added internally.

"What … what about Sans? Could he have taken it?" continued Alphys. "Maybe it's in his room?"

"NO. I DOUBT IT." He looked guilty, like he was letting them into a big secret. "I THINK HE WAS AFRAID OF IT AND WHEN I WENT BACK IT WAS STILL THERE…"

"You went back?"

"I DID? I THINK… I DID" Papyrus rubbed his temples "I DON'T REMEMBER…"

"What were the four words? Do you remember them?" insisted Alphys. He felt Undyne's hand on her shoulder and she looked up at her blushing. "I… I'm sorry …. You …. We are all very tired and we sh…"

Papyrus got up startling her and rummaged through a kitchen drawer. He pulled out a worn notepad and pencil and sat back down. He quickly scribbled the words on them and pushed the notepad towards the group.

"I DON'T KNOW WHAT THEY MEAN …"

Everybody leaned in to look at what was written on the pad. Alphys made a sound between a squeal and a gasp. She covered her snout with both of her hands. She was sure she had seen this writing before! She was also sure she was getting looks from everybody else. Before she could say anything, however, Asgore pointed to the second word.

"I believe this means "Night"" he said then pointed to the third word "and I think this means "Prince""

"That's oddly sweet sounding" commented Undyne "For something that's supposed to be scary"

"Well … I think it comes down to personal meaning" said Alphys looking over the words. "The words may be innocent enough to the average monster, but they may have been instituted to be some kind of mental trigger for Sans when he was being deve…..uuuuuhhh…. sorry"

Toriel gave Alphys a reproaching look. She obviously didn't appreciate Alphys referring to Sans as being any kind of experiment.

"You're such a nerd" said Undyne rubbing the top of Alphys head in an attempt to diffuse the situation.

"It's getting late" said Asgore joining Undyne's efforts. "Maybe we..."

Alphys' cellphone started vibrating for the umpteen time, interrupting Asgore. Alphys reached for it embarrassed.

"Um … sorry! " she looked at the screen "I need to answer this. The team at the Core has been trying to reach me for awhile now"

The female lizard scooted out of her seat and walked into the living room for some privacy. Frisk jumped out of their mom's lap and climbed unto Papyrus to give him a hug. Papyrus returned the affection with one of his own. Toriel got up and ruffled Frisk's hair and kissed the top of Papyrus' skull. Undyne and Asgore quietly discussed their options regarding the group that was currently on the lookout for Gaster.

Alphys walked back in putting her cell phone back in her pocket. "Phew! At least the Core is going back online … that's one less thing to worry about…"

Nobody had expected Sans to scream.


	10. sorry

Papyrus was up and already halfway to his brother's room by the time everyone else reacted to Sans' screaming. He had never heard him scream in such a way before. It was guttural and raw; a sound of sudden, disarming fear. It echoed in the pit of your belly and invaded your head, clawing for comfort. There were no words, no pleads, no reasoning behind it. It existed wishing it didn't. Every running step was too slow in Papyrus' mind. Since when was Sans's bedroom so far away from the kitchen? Every minute, every second, every breath it took to get there was one too many.

He burst through the door and immediately felt a heaviness overtake him but he was too focused on his brother to even think about acknowledging it. Sans was lying on his bed curled up on his right side. His hands were in tight fists over his chest. He barely gave himself time to breathe in a couple of gulps before he screamed again. Papyrus's ran to his brother's side calling his name.

"SANS, SANS!, ITS OK! YOU'RE SAFE!" He tried to sound soothing by forcing his naturally loud voice a few decibels lower regardless of the emotions that kept cracking it. He winced when Sans let out another scream. "PLEASE, PLEASE, YOU'RE OK, PLEASE WAKE UP"

Somebody called out his name and he looked up to see his friends busying themselves with whatever they thought might help the situation. He felt like he was underwater, sounds other than Sans' screaming were muffled, shapes vague. He saw Undyne help Alphys pick up equipment that had been thrown to the floor. He heard Toriel ask Frisk to fetch some things for her from their home down the road. Asgore was near one of the walls, his arm extended in front of him. It was then that Papyrus became aware of the blue flames covering everything in the room.

Sans' magic.

Slowly, as if waking up from a dream, Papyrus noticed himself being covered in flame. Despite resembling fire in presence, there was no heat to blue magic. It was magic based on JUDGEMENT, accusation or forgiveness. When wielded by a monster's will it was capable of a lot of damage and it could take on the form of your worse fears or in contrast, your most fanciful dreams. The flames on his body were not Sans', they were his own magic reacting to the wild display in the room. It explained the heaviness in his soul. He shook his head and shoulders in an attempt to clear the feeling away, but it stayed.

Another scream but this one was cut short by Sans' desperate gasps for air. He was suffocating.

Toriel was at his side in an instant and instructed him to help his brother sit up to help him breathe better. He pulled on Sans' arms but the short skeleton absolutely refused to move them. Fearing he might harm him further if he insisted. He switched tactics and instead he pushed his arm under him and practically picked him up into a sitting position.

Sans continued to gasp for air and his screams were replaced by pitiful groaning and moaning. His whole body was shaking. His eyes were clamped shut in pain and Papyrus doubted that he was even aware of where he was if he was awake at all. He continued calling out his name, hoping. PRAYING. That it would somehow reach him.

Suddenly he felt Asgore's paw on his shoulder. He looked up and saw him smiling at him. A warm orange aura emanated from the former king and slowly but relentlessly it began to overtake Sans' blue flames.

Warm red orange magic. The King's magic.

The magic of MERCY. The power to give or take it away.

Papyrus knew that Asgore was a powerful magic user but he had never seen his magic at work. It was so rare for him to use it.

When the King's magic reached him, Sans gave one long gasp then went completely limp in Papyrus's arms.

"SANS!" yelled Papyrus and cradled his brother's head under his chin.

"What's going on?" asked Toriel looking both at Asgore and Alphys who was quickly resetting equipment as fast as she could.

"I am not sure. It felt like a battle being waged between Sans and … his soul" answered Asgore "It felt like his soul was trying to flee and his magic was keeping it from doing so. He was losing. I gave him the option to give Mercy to himself. However, I'm afraid this is only temporary. I believe that the moment I release my magic, the battle will just resume"

Asgore looked down guiltily. False hope was the only thing he could give them.

"Thank you" said Toriel smiling softly at him.

Papyrus smiled at him also but his grip on his brother tightened. He was grateful to Asgore for his magic helping his brother but he knew that no matter how strong a magic user he was, he couldn't keep it up forever.

"WHY DIDN'T THIS HAPPEN BEFORE?" he asked "WHAT TRIGGERED … THIS ATTACK? THE WORDS … I'M SURE HE DIDN'T FINISH SAYING THE WORDS"

"Yeah!" said Undyne rubbing her chin "He was sleeping just fine before"

"the CORE!" exclaimed Alphys suddenly snapping her fingers. "Papyrus, didn't you say that Gaster suddenly disappeared after attacking your brother?"

Papyrus nodded.

"And … and … the readings on the Core were freaking out while the atta… incident was going on!"

Papyrus gulped, really not wanting to relieve the events from earlier that day. God, had it really only been a day?

"AND … according to you, Gaster was the one who created the Core! Somehow they're connected! …" Alphys was pacing the room now "Maybe he discovered a way to use the magic emanating from it as a … as a … as a power source for himself! … I wonder how …"

"HE DIED THERE" said Papyrus looking at his brother's face.

Everyone looked at him. What?

But Papyrus didn't feel like talking anymore. He hung his head and closed his eyes.

After a moment of silence, Undyne cleared her throat and rubbed her neck. "Sooo… are you saying we should shut down the Core again?"

"Um … yes… " said Alphys "Of course, this will make a lot of monsters unhappy and well … the Capital has come to depend on the electricity it provides, and there is no guarantee that it will help us save Sans in … the long run"

"I wish I could have a word with that horrible man!" said Toriel "How dare him! How dare he put both of you through all of that! I'm sorry Papyrus, I know he's your father but …"

Toriel stopped herself when she realized that Papyrus wasn't even listening to their conversation anymore. He was still holding his brother close to him and rubbing his forehead gently against his, a very skeleton way to show affection. She knew he was already physically and emotionally spent before Sans started screaming. She sighed. They all were.

She heard the front door open and close. Soon after, Frisk appeared in the bedroom doorway holding a wicker basket. They were breathing hard, obviously having run all the way home and back. Toriel felt a pang of guilt. While she did think at the time that she would need her medical supplies, she had to admit that the main reason she sent Frisk on that errand was to spare them seeing Sans in such a state. She opened her arms to them and they ran into them. Frisk gave her a questioning look.

"It's alright" she reassured them. "He's sleeping again"

Frisk then looked over to Asgore, who had taken a seat at the foot of Sans' bed. He had a serious look on his face but his body look relaxed. A faint aura surrounded him as he concentrated on keeping his magic going for as long as he could.

"Asgore is helping him with his magic" Toriel explained again. Frisk smiled at the goat monster and he smiled back rolling his shoulders back proudly.

Frisk gave Toriel the wicker basket they'd been carrying and started to climb into bed with Sans. Toriel stopped them by grabbing their hand.

"No dear, it's better to let them rest" she said.

Frisk made a quick kissing motion on their palm and wiggled their arm free.

"ITS OK" said Papyrus looking at Toriel and Frisk "I THINK THEY JUST WANT TO KISS SANS GOODNIGHT"

Frisk nodded and gently climbed onto the bed and shuffled until they were kneeling across Papyrus. They kissed Sans left cheek then leaned over and kissed Papyrus' right cheek. They sat back and stayed there for a few moments in contemplation.

They brought both their hands up to their chest and winced. They made the hand signs for "soul" and "hurt". Papyrus looked at them sadly.

Frisk's face suddenly became serious and grabbed Sans's left hand and held it against their cheek. After a few moments, tears started pouring out of their eyes.

"I… I… can't" they said in a raspy barely used voice. "I can't"

Papyrus looked at them utterly confused. Toriel reached for Frisk and pulled them into her arms. "What's the matter my child?"

"Reset" whispered Frisk and buried their face in her shoulder.

Everyone exchanged glances. They all knew about the Resets now but it was still a concept hard to grasp. It was one of the few things Frisk was not willing to talk about too much. It was not like they understood how they worked to begin with. It was just something they were able to do.

Correction, used to be able to do.

"DID YOU JUST TRY TO…?" asked Papyrus.

The child nodded while keeping their face buried in Toriel's shoulder.

"Oh dear one …" Toriel patted their child's back.

Behind them Alphys was running scenarios in her head; she had actually considered Frisk's ability to reset timelines, even though she wasn't quite sure how that worked, but only as a last resort. She was wriggling her hands raw and Undyne must've noticed because she leaned down and put her own hands on hers.

"Babe, it's ok. We'll figure it out" she said kissing her on the forehead.

"But … but … we don't have a lot of time. I need more information! Maybe if we get a hold of that journal, I can figure out a way to null the effect those words have on Sans. Or maybe change them … Oh … I don't know!"

"Let's rest" said Toriel. It was more of a command than a suggestion. "At least for a few hours"

"Yes. You all need rest" agreed Asgore "I can stay here and keep watch"

"Are you sure?" asked Alphys "This must be very draining on you"

"This is nothing" laughed Asgore reassuringly "I can keep this up for a few hours at least!"

"Besides…" he continued, growing a little more regal making Alphy's stomach do a flip "I want to help"

"YEAH! The King is tough as nails! I should know!" declared Undyne.

"Ok" said Toriel giving everyone a sharp nod. She put Frisk down. "Wipe those tears child. No harm done. Will you keep me company and rest with me?"

Frisk sniffled and wiped their eyes with their sleeves. They turned around and gave Papyrus and Sans quick hug. They hand signaled the word "Sorry"

Papyrus patted their head. "NO NEED. I WOULD'VE TRIED TOO. PROMISE OR NO PROMISE"

Frisk sniffed again and went to give Asgore his kiss goodnight. Asgore ruffled their head and a little hug in return. Frisk turned to leave with Toriel. Undyne followed them.

Alphys approached Papyrus.

"How is he doing?" she asked.

"HIS BREATHING IS …TOO SOFT" Papyrus said letting go of Sans enough so Alphys could have a better look at him.

"Shallow" corrected Alphys. She checked Sans' vitals. He was back at the state he was before his attack. It had to be the reactivation of the Core that triggered. It HAD TO. It was too much of a coincidence. They had to shut down the Core but first, first she had to plan.

"Majes… I mean … Asgore" she started to ask the goat monster then realized that he had gotten up and moved to the furthest part of the room from the bed.

"It's easier to keep an eye on everything from here" said Asgore when he noticed Alphys' questioning look.

Alphys suspected it was more to do with giving Papyrus and Sans some space than surveillance. "I'm sorry, I don't mean to offend … but … but for how long, _exactly_ , do you think you can keep this room protected?"

Asgore blinked at her a little confused. "A few hours more"

"Yeah…. How many hours are a _few hours_? … I'm sorry… I just need to know a number we can … you know … plan around"

"I would say four – five hours" answered Asgore finally understanding.

It was an impressive number. Most monsters could only keep their magic active for a few minutes at the time, an hour perhaps, if you trained on it. She had seen Undyne keep up her magic for a couple of hours and that had taken a LOT out of her. "So… so… it is safe to say that we have four hours? Five if you absolutely have to?"

"Yes. Do you have something in mind?" asked Asgore raising an eyebrow.

"Y… yes. I'm going to try and shut down the Core again"

Asgore hm'd at this but didn't disagree.

"But, but I want to give the monsters in the underground some advance notice to expect it again. Hope… hopefully … this will minimize the consequences…"

"That's very wise of you dear"

Alphys nodded nervously "Yes, yes… thank you" and turned around to hide her blush. "Papyrus? You should get some sleep as well"

"I WILL" said Papyrus repositioning his brother on the bed so he would have space to climb in "BUT I AM NOT LEAVING HIM"

"Ok" she said heading for the door. She nodded to the former king and then to Papyrus. "I will wake us up in three hours" She announced although she doubted she would get that much sleep herself.

As the door closed behind the scientist, Papyrus curled up around Sans. He put his right hand on his chest.

Before he knew it, he was asleep.

* * *

.

..

….

At least he hoped he was asleep.

He couldn't see anything but it felt too … physical? It didn't have quite that cloudy … spongy … feel that his dreams usually had.

To be incredibly plain, it just felt wrong.

For one, there were no bunnies.

So.

Well.

He had never been here before. He was pretty sure about that.

He gave it some more thought.

Yep. Preeettttyyyy suuuurrreee.

He spun in place trying to get a sense of the place. It was a rather empty place. It would be the definition of empty if it wasn't for him being there. That … and there was a floor. Oh wait, there wasn't.

He fell.

He didn't know why, but he had expected it to be a rather long fall but it wasn't. It couldn't, in all good conscience, call this a fall. It had been more of a tumble.

It was still dark but here was the floor again. At least this time it felt more stable. He started to get up and banged in head on something metallic. "OW!"

"turn on the light, bro"

The lights went on and Papyrus found himself in Sans' old bedroom back in the Underground. The offending metallic object had been Sans' old treadmill.

"YOU PRANKED ME…" said Papyrus looking at the old piece of equipment.

"well… tech…"

"ACROSS TIME AND SPACE!" continued Papyrus still looking at the machine.

"…technically you …."

"I HATE THAT!"

"…. um … yeah … but"

"YOU BONEHEAD!" roared Papyrus and spun around to embrace his brother in a hug but stumbled forwards instead. There was nothing to hug.

Papyrus turned to his right. There was Sans. There was his brother looking a bit ragged, a few small cracks on his face but otherwise ok. Awake. Alive. Smiling.

"SANS!" Papyrus started another hug attempt but Sans stopped him with a raised hand.

"woah there bro. i'm sorry, but i think we should avoid contact" his smile faltered a little bit and his eyes went dark "i'm not sure what would happen if we touch"

"WHAT? WHATEVER ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?"

"welp" Sans' eyes light up again "you're not actually, here-here, but more like a little bit over there and a smidge here"

"BROTHER …" whined Papyrus

"hey, i don't understand it that well myself. i just have a really good guess"

"ARE YOU SAYING THAT THIS IS NOT YOUR BEDROOM?"

"no. i think this is your memory of my bedroom and … think you don't remember it that well because my walls were never this color" said Sans and he sounded a little annoyed at this.

"WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? ALL THE WALLS IN OUR OLD HOUSE WERE THE SAME COLOR!"

"no. they were green!" exclaimed Sans. He stumbled back a step and rubbed the left side of his head "sorry"

"SANS ARE YOU OK?" Papyrus fought the urge to reach out for his brother.

"it's … it's hard to keep it together lately. you could say that i am of two minds about this whole situation" He tiredly winked at Papyrus.

"SANS … PLEASE DON'T JOKE…"

"right. right." said Sans walking over to his mattress "old habits and all that. anyway, as I was saying, this not my bedroom in the underground. i think we're in the void." He motioned for Papyrus to sit down on the mattress "more importantly, i'm in the void, you're just visiting. i think it's your presence that's dressing up the place, although, i'll be honest bro, i would've gone with the mtt resort. much nicer"

"THE VOID?" Papyrus sat down still processing all the information. He had never heard of such a place but he was quickly connecting the dots. "IT'S THAT WHERE DAD WAS?"

"yes"

"WHERE IS THIS VOID? HOW DID DAD AND YOU END UP HERE?"

Sans shrugged. "beats me. i just woke up here and suddenly there you were falling through the ceiling"

Papyrus looked up expecting to see a hole but there was nothing there, just a lot of ceiling. He frowned.

"HOW?... NO! NO TIME FOR THAT! YOU'RE REAL RIGHT? THIS IS NOT A DREAM?"Again, Papyrus got up and stomped over to his brother. Sans shrunk away from his touch and put some distance between them.

"papyrus, please … " Sans looked at Papyrus pained expression and sighed "look"

Sans reached out and touched the treadmill with one finger. The machine shimmered, wavered and then it was gone.

""real" is a really iffy concept here. as far as i know, YOU'RE the only real thing here. i don't want to risk you disappearing or maybe even getting stuck here by coming in contact with me"

"THEN I'LL GET STUCK WITH YOU!" Papyrus shook his head and balled his fists stubbornly "DO YOU REALLY EXPECT ME TO LEAVE HERE ALL ALONE? "

"no" Sans looked away.

"OF COURSE NOT! WE'RE BROTHERS! WE STICK TOGETHER NO MATTER WHAT!" said Papyrus coming closer. This time Sans didn't move away. "ALL OF OUR FRIENDS ARE LOOKING FOR A WAY TO HELP YOU! US!"

"you won't leave me alone…"

"NEVER! REMEMBER WHAT I SAID BACK WHEN WE WERE YOUNGER?" Papyrus was just a few inches away. He spread his arms preparing for the biggest hug ever "YOU'RE MY RESPONSIBILITY! YOU'RE MY…"

"PAPYRUS, STAND DOWN!" growled Sans freezing the taller skeleton in place. "I TOLD YOU NOT TO TOUCH ME!"

Papyrus was completely disarmed. He took several steps back, almost falling backwards again.

"sorry" said Sans his eyes were dark and he was rubbing the left side of his head again "sorry, sorry, sorry" There was an echo to his voice that Papyrus hadn't noticed before "i am just horrible, ain't i? you come all this way and all I do is yell at you. i can't even be nice to you anymore."

"SANS…"

"i … don't even feel like myself anymore" Sans rambled on "everything is messed up in my head … i … i … don't think i can …"

"SANS…"

"why even bother? Wouldn't you wanT your fAtheR back insTead?" He stopped talking and stood very still composing himself. He reached for his chest. Sans soul shimmered through his clothes.

"this soul loves you" Sans said quietly "it loves the friends it made. it cherishes the memories with you and them. But …"

"It's not mine to keep"

Without warning, Sans was enveloped up in a fierce hug. His whole body tensed up in horror upon the realization of what Papyrus had done. He tried to break free but his brother was having none of it.

The room around them wavered and parts of the walls started to crumble away. What Papyrus saw beyond the walls made him shudder.

Complete and utter darkness.

The skeleton thought he had known darkness before but had it had been darkness just on the other side of light. It was frightening but you knew, _you_ _knew_ that light and safety were just a short distance away. This … this darkness was all consuming. There was no light to even dream about.

This was the Void.

"You Bonehead" he heard Sans say. His tears fell on Papyrus' chest "There is no Hope for me"

"THEN HAVE MY HOPE. HAVE ALL OF MY HOPE" said Papyrus "I'LL GET YOU OUT OF HERE. WE'LL DEAL WITH DAD TOGETHER"

Sans tensed up again at the mention of Gaster. The cracks at the top of his right eye widened. He buried his face his brother's chest.

"Your father only wants back what is rightfully his" he said in a tone barely above a whisper. "You know you are not totally innocent in this. He wouldn't have ended up in the Void if it wasn't for your intervention"

"SANS?" Papyrus pulled his brother away from his chest. His pupils were still gone. The room started disappearing faster. He held his brother's face in his hands. "STOP IT"

* * *

 _"STOP IT!" Papyrus yelled at his father struggling to be heard above the Core's blaring alarm, but his father ignored him and continued his attack on Sans. He saw his brother fall to his hands and knees in response to the second command word, his face contorted with pain "NO!"_

 _Papyrus ran up to his father and grabbed his arm. Gaster threw him off without even looking at him. His eyes were wild, irrational._

 _Papyrus looked on in horror. He suddenly realized that there was dust on his mittens and on his clothes. It was Gaster's dust. It was coming from the wound on his side. He didn't have to look far to see the weapon that caused it. A knife laid on the floor right in front of Sans. It shone red under the caution lights. Sans had stabbed his father._

 _And now,_

 _Now,_

 _Gaster was destroying him._

 _They were killing each other!_

 _No, no, no, no, no!_

 _This wasn't supposed to happen. They were family! His family! What went to so wrong?_

 _Somewhere far away, a monotone voice announced one minute before lockdown._

 _Sans looked at him and yelled at him to run, to get out of there as fast as he could._

 _The third word was said and Papyrus was on his feet again. His ten year old body felt like it was moving all on its own. His head rang with thoughts of self preservation while his heart screamed for mercy for his brother._

 _For his father._

 _He would make his father listen to him._

 _"STOP!" he screamed as he rammed into him._

 _Gaster stumbled backwards into the balcony overlooking the Core. He looked up surprised, as if he had just noticed that Papyrus had been in the room with him._

 _"Pa…pyrus!" he heard him say in a shocked voice. "Why… how are you here?"_

 _30 seconds._

 _"I'M SORRY DAD!" said Papyrus tearing up. He got up to go help his father but was stopped by an arm around his waist. Sans._

 _"We have to get out of here!" he said between gritted teeth, his left eye ablaze with blue and yellow._

 _"WHAT ABOUT DAD?" asked Papyrus flailing to get free from Sans' grasp._

 _Sans didn't respond, instead he just held on tighter._

 _"DON'T TAKE HIM!" roared Gaster as a metal door started closing in between him and his son. "THIEF!"_

 _The metal door to the balcony shut close along with the door on the other side of the control room._

 _They were trapped._

 _Zero._

 _The Core exploded._

* * *

It had been all his fault. This was all his fault.

Sans blinked and his pupils are alight again. "sorry" he said drying his and Papyrus' tears with his sleeves. He looked around at the crumbling room. "you are losing it. you need to leave bro"

"NO! I WON'T LEAVE YOU ALONE!" said Papyrus trying to bring Sans back into his embrace, but this time the smaller skeleton had been faster and Papyrus found himself pushed away with more force that he wouldn't have expected Sans to have without his magic.

The room split in two between them, the void pouring in through the cracks.

"SANS!" yelled Papyrus as the darkness surrounded his brother.

He was falling again.

"remember your friends. remember your home" he heard Sans say.

"ReMeMBer. Me."

.

..

…

He heard other voices calling his name. A warm light surrounded him as several hands reached for him.

Papyrus eyes snapped open. He saw the last flickers of navy blue magic dissipating from his right hand. He was clutching Sans's shirt in the spot right above where his soul was.

"Papyrus! Oh thank goodness!" He heard Toriel say from behind him.

"You scared us Papyrus!" said Undyne from somewhere else "What is it with you skeletons and drama?"

He also heard a small hand hitting an arm "Ow! What? He didn't even let us sleep a full hour before he went all night terror on us!"

"Undyne, this is not the time" Asgored warned.

"Ok, ok, sorry, geez"

"Papyrus?" Toriel. Her voice was laced with worry.

Papyrus looked at the hand clutching his brother's shirt. It took some effort but he managed to command it to let go. He flexed it a couple of times to get some feeling back into it.

He quickly inspected his brother. Nothing had changed. He was still in a deep sleep. His face was free of cracks, he was grateful at least for that.

It didn't matter if it had been a dream or not.

Papyrus would not forget again.

"I HAVE TO GO SEE MY FATHER!" announced Papyrus to no one's surprise but everyone's dismay. "I CAN'T WAIT. I NEED TO SEE HIM NOW! I AM NOT LETTING SANS STAY IN THAT HORRIBLE PLACE ANY LONGER THAN NECESSARY!"

"But Papyrus … " said Alphys eyeing Sans' body on the bed "Are you sure it wasn't just a bad dream?"

"NO. BUT I CAN'T RISK THAT IT WASN'T!" exclaimed Papyrus making the female lizard shrink a little bit.

Undyne stepped in front of her protectively.

"Look Papyrus. We get it. Alright?" she motioned towards Sans "None of us wants this. We want Sans back too! If you won't LISTEN to reason, I will POUND it into you!"

"Where would you even go to see your father?" asked Toriel coming in between them. She kept her voice calm but firm.

"THE CORE" he said "HE HAS TO BE THERE!"

"Let's say he IS there" said Undyne following Toriel's example and calming her voice down "Isn't that the place where he would be the strongest? How are you planning to fight him?"

"NO. I'LL SPEAK TO HIM. I'LL … CONVINCE HIM TO LET SANS KEEP HIS SOUL. THERE HAS TO BE ANOTHER WAY…. I'LL …"

"I honestly don't think that will work" said Undyne. There was sadness in her voice. "Papyrus, I know that you believe that everyone can get along, but going by what you have told us about this guy … I really don't think he's the let's-hug-it-out kind of guy"

Papyrus pinched the bridge of his nose. He really couldn't argue with Undyne about that. "I HAVE TO DO SOMETHING!"

Undyne rubbed the back of her neck. "Let's … let's think about this strategically. Alphys said she could shut down the Core…"

"Um… actually, I can't" said Alphys meekly from behind her.

"What?"

"While you guys were sleeping … I tried to issue another command for shut down after Asgore's protection wore off but … but I was denied" she said, ashamed that she was disappointing her friends again. "Last time it was an emergency be… because of the erratic readings, but they … the city council and the Core crew, won't shut it down just because I … I … feel it's necessary. There are still hundreds of monsters living in the Capital and they depend on the power the Core provides"

"I thought you could shut it down from here" Undyne put her hand on Alphys' shoulder.

Alphys shook her head. "I'm sorry! I know I made it sound like I could but … It's a two part process if I do it via my laptop. I can start it but it also needs for the head of the crew to confirm the order on her end. I didn't think she would side with the city council and deny the shutdown"

Undyne shook her head and sighed. "It's ok …. Wait … you said "via your laptop" Does that mean you could do it directly if you were at the Core?"

"Ye... yeah" sniffed Alphys "but… with security and…"

"Then WE'RE going to the Core!" announced Undyne maybe a little too excitedly.

"WE?" asked Papyrus

"YES, WE" confirmed Undyne crossing her arms in front of her. "ME and Alphys are going with you but first, we're going to stop by your house in Snowdin since we're going to need a Plan B"

"PLAN B?"

"You're going to Snowdin and get your dad's dear diary" Undyne said "We can't depend on you convincing your dad to not be an assh…"

"UNDYNE!" said Toriel covering Frisk's ears.

"An … assertive turkey neck" paraphrased Undyne rolling her eyes. "Anyway, if there is any way to save Sans without your father's … cooperation, it has to be in that journal!"

"Yeah, it makes sense!" said Alphys.

"THEN WE'LL GO KICK YOUR DAD'S BUTT!" Undyne laughed finding her second wind in potential bloodshed. She stopped laughing when she remembered where she was. "After we try having a nice conversation with him, of course"

She coughed.

Papyrus stared at her. He didn't know if he should be grateful at Undyne or just plain terrified of her. He decided on the former.

"LET'S GO!" with renewed hope.

* * *

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.

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.

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.

.

.

.

.

.

Somewhere in the Underground a house burned. The few monsters that still lived in the area wondered how it could've happened, but they were glad that it had been empty for a long time.


	11. Final (Part I)

**My Brother's Keeper – Chapter 11 Part I - (Final Chapter)**

 **" _Leave a light on. Home is no place for me."_**

He wanted to laugh.

After all, he technically got what he wanted. He was free from living and the responsibilities thereof. Well, almost. There was still the matter of the soul, that somehow, had come along with him to this, otherwise empty, place.

He looked down at his chest. He could see his body clearly despite the complete lack of light. A passing thought whispered to him that maybe he was just imagining his body. That everything physical or real about him was long gone. Dust in the wind as the humans said.

But Papyrus had acted like he was still real, somewhere, during their short reunion.

In fact…

His brother had acted as if he was merely trapped there. Not gone, forever.

Huh.

He hovered his hand over his chest, and finally, he touched it. His soul shone brightly through his bony fingers.

His soul. HIS.

He giggled. Such a horrid sound coming from him but he liked it anyway. He was that he still could still feel his body under his fingers. _That he still felt alive._ He wasn't kidding anybody -Not that there was anybody else to kid in that place- When it came down to it, he honestly didn't want to die.

Had he, ever?

Well…

It really didn't matter if he did or not. What mattered was that he didn't want to die _now_.

He laughed.

He laughed until he cried.

He was so stupid.

* * *

 ** _"I see my destination. Wish I had known my journey."_**

A happy ending. That's all Gaster ever wanted. It had been such an impossible goal for such a long time that he had never given much thought as to what a happy ending would entail.

What a happy ending would _cost him_.

This end, costed him _everything_. His home, his family, his life. His _legacy_. As a happy ending, this wasn't much of one. To be quite honest, it right down -well- _Sucked._

He giggled childishly at the word. He didn't even remember coming close to giggling when he was previously alive. He deserved those confused looks from the monsters around him. It was a horrible sound coming from him.

He put a trembling hand over his mouth. Before him, a raging fire was in the process of destroying his former home. He had to admit that he hadn't intended for the whole thing to burn but once you got started it was admittedly hard to stop. The warm sensation of magic fire was intriguingly intoxicating. Maybe because it had been a long time since he had felt anything warm, or cold, or any other temperature.

The dancing flames inspired visions in his head. A small skeleton child running around and laughing at the silliest of jokes. Snowball fights. A nightmare soothed with nuzzles and hugs. The small skeleton child asking why his father was never around.

Another giggle was stifled under his hand. Then, from somewhere deep inside him he registered that he was also sad. Or that he should be. He tilted his head in self contemplation. Yes, he WAS sad. Yeah, those were tears in his eyes.

Oh.

 _Oooooooh._

These memories. These precious memories that weren't his. His soul's memories. HIS memories.

Why where they there, twisting his insides?

He spat feeling contaminated. He had no time to dwell. He had to travel back to the Core now that he had what he needed.

He separated from the crowd watching his house burn down. There wasn't much point to fighting a magical fire. It would put itself out once it finished consuming its intended target. Sure there was a general worry about why the fire started among the gathered monsters, but, if one had to be completely honest and happened to be in fairly non-judgmental company, they would admit this was the most interesting thing to happen in Snowdin in quite a while.

Gaster quickly wiped the tears away with his good hand and teleported into the forest.

.

..

...

 _Phasing back to the Core had been an extremely stressful experience. He must've laid unconscious for a while because when he woke his whole body felt heavy, sore and hungry. His fingers had been healed back into place but they were still difficult to move. It would take at least a couple more days before he regained full use of his hand again. Having a corporeal body seemed like a good thing at first, but it was so inconvenient at times._

 _Luckily any monster or human (human?) present at the Core at the time of his awakening had been holed up in the control center. He could see their shapes running around in a state of controlled panic, through the one big window that overlooked the deep lava pit. He had materialized in the catwalk just right under it._

 _Usually, this would be a problem, since it would still mean that he had to walk through the Control Room in order to leave the Core, but for Gaster it just meant that he would have to teleport._

 _So he did._

 _And right after he teleported, he fell to his knees. His mind was reeling._

 _Since when could he teleport?_

 _When he first left the Void, his body was still more of a thought than something physical, so he could "phase" to wherever he needed to go with the help of the Core's power. But now that he was corporeal … now … now he was teleporting? He never had used his magic in such way before. Was it a natural evolution of what he had learned in the Void? Or was it …_

 _… Oh._

 _No this wasn't something he learned to do. Sans did. He was accessing information that Sans knew._

 _The Core incident had not only affected him but had also affected the thief's abilities, and he had figured out how to use this mutation of his powers to his advantage. All on his own._

 _Gaster allowed himself to be impressed, if only for a moment._

 _It made sense. After all, technically, the thief was him. A defective, diluted him, but still him._

 _Of course he was smart._

 _He sat back on his haunches and concentrated suddenly curious. He wondered what other "discoveries" Sans had made._

 _Fragments of memories exploded inside his brain and he fell backwards. It was overwhelming!_

 _There was a lifetime of them._

 _No._

 ** _Several lifetimes of them._**

 _What? The memories were still vague and they seemed to repeat themselves over and over. He put his hands on the sides of his head as a sudden headache overtook him. Human children flickered in and out of view. These children could reset time? No … they were all different versions of the same child._

 _Time travel. No, more like time looping. They were actively destroying and restarting timelines and somehow, Sans was able to follow them even if he couldn't do the destroying and restarting himself._

 _He had seen this himself. Yes, yes, he had. During one of the few time where circumstances were just right for allowing him to visit the real world, even if for a few moments. He had seen the kid, yes. He hadn't realized that at the time that he had seen a human child. He had been so startled by the fact that someone had been able to see him that he had phased right back into the Void._

 _That had been unfortunate._

 _So, all those scenes he had witness from him rare windows into the real world had not been from his own timeline, but several new ones … In fact, all memories from that timeline stopped right after the Core incident. He suspected that this timeline he was in wasn't his original one, and that somehow, the thief had managed to escape it with Papyrus as well._

 _Without Gaster, they shouldn't have been able to exist anywhere else. Two entities without an origin source. How interesting and frustrating…_

 _Such wasted power._

 _He wanted to know more but that's all his brief contact with the thief had given him._

 _He sat in silence for a few moment allowing his mind to settle._

 _Nothing had gone right. He wanted to laugh at the stupidity of all of it._

 _If he reclaimed his soul back now, in this state, he risked his own being being lost in that endless sea of memories._

 _Other monsters may eventually forget Sans but he would never be able to. His knowledge and memories would be part of the scientist, forever._

 _No, no, this wouldn't do at all. He did not want that traitor living on inside his mind._

 _He needed to find a way around this. He hated that he craved all this new knowledge. That he was envious of all the happy memories the thief had with his son._

 _He thought back on his notes and observations, perhaps the answer was there. He decided that he needed to return to where all began: To his lab._

 _The thought of his lab triggered another fragment of memory. He saw his son keeping something away from his grasp and laughing. He recognized the item as his journal. (How did he get that?!) Immediately the answer came as he saw his hand … the thief's hand… opening the drawer where he kept his confidential papers._

 _So Papyrus knew … he knew that early on…. Gaster should've known. His son did seem to change how he related to him around that timeframe. He wasn't as … trusting._

 _Damn you._

 _At least the thief had had the courtesy to feel regret at showing his young son the journal. He saw his son's face twisted with fear of … what? The journal? His father?_

 ** _Damn you. Damn you._**

 _He got up and dusted himself off. Not that there was really any dust on him but the gesture helped. He looked at his ragged clothes and mildly made note that he was lucky that they survived his "vacation" from reality along with the rest of his body._

 _The big rip on the side of his coat made him grimace._

 _He would make sure that when the time came to collect, he would make the erasure of the thief to be as complete and painful as possible._

* * *

 ** _"Don't follow me. I'll only hold you back"_**

Grillby did not appreciate the comments. Being the only fire elemental in town did not mean that he was responsible for all and any mysterious magic fire in town. The comments were all made in good fun –sure- but fun had no place in this instance. His good friend's house had been destroyed.

He knew that the skeleton brothers had a brand new home in the Overland, and by all accounts, they were happy. But he always felt that at least one of them would eventually return. That particular one being Sans, of course. This was no wishful thinking on his part. This was just him knowing his friend really well.

Sans had expressed often that he had no dreams of living in the Overland among the humans. That wasn't even his brother's wish. As far as Papyrus was concerned, he just wanted to see everyone happy and free. As for Sans, he wanted to see his brother's wish come true, for his brother's sake. Personally, he just wanted a chance to see real stars and learn about new scientific discoveries. He didn't need to live up there on a permanent basis to do that.

As social and outgoing Sans was in the surface, the fire elemental knew that ultimately, Sans was a creature of habit. He had his comfortable places and people that he preferred. The Overland was just too new and too unpredictable for his friend's tastes. He knew he would eventually make his way back.

He knew...

Ok. Maybe there was a little bit of wishful thinking mixed in there.

The house fire had died down to embers by early afternoon. The curious group that had surrounded the house at the beginning had dispersed by now and only the fire elemental was left keeping watch. His restaurant was no longer as busy as it once was, so now he only opened it at nightfall. He spent the daytime with his books. Reading and learning more about human cuisine, since more and more humans seemed to be visiting Snowdin.

He hoped things looked up soon. He didn't relish the idea of having to move to the Overland to make a living. He would, if he had to, he certainly had the means. He just preferred to postpone it until he didn't have to worry about it anymore. Monsters and humans alike liked to ask him why he stayed. You'd think that a fire elemental would prefer the Hotlands, at the very least, or to live in a sunny place in the Overland. For them, he always had the same answer: "I like the quiet" followed by a variation of "Would you like to order anything else?"

This answer, wasn't entirely true, but Grillby didn't let that stop him from using it.

He picked up a small piece of brick still hot from the fire. He played with it with the tip of his fiery fingers until it disintegrated.

That house and its residents had always been a mystery to him.

 _The brothers had just showed up one day and moved into biggest house in town. Nobody really knew how they came to acquire it but nobody questioned their ownership. They had a set of keys with them and seemed to know where everything was in the house, so that was enough for a regular Snowdin resident. Papyrus once mentioned to Grillby that he was pretty sure that they rented, and that Sans was the one in charge of paying for the rent. He never saw any overdue bills, so he figured that his brother was just really good at their finances. When Grillby asked who their landlord was, Papyrus had looked lost for a moment then shrugged._

 _"Some rich monster in the Capital" he said then moved on to complain about a dog that kept sneaking into their house and stealing all his "special attacks"._

Grillby overturned a piece of burnt wood with his foot.

 _The next day after they moved in, Sans strolled into Grillby's and greeted everyone by name. He made friends easy and he looked genuinely happy and relaxed. When he approached the bar, he greeted Grillby with a familiarity of a longtime friend. What was odd to the fire elemental reciprocated this feeling. He felt as if he had known the skeleton for years. When Sans ordered a burger, Grillby knew exactly how the skeleton liked it._

 _"I'm sorry. Have we met before?" Grillby had finally asked when he brought the food over._

 _The skeleton regarded him for a few seconds before answering with a huge grin._

 _"no" he said "i just have one of those faces"._

Grillby stared at the remains of a couch. So much for wishful thinking….

.

..

...

 **'WHAT HAPPENED?!"**

Grillby whirled around to see a distraught Papyrus running towards the remains of the house. Not far behind him, Undyne and Alphys hurried after. The fire elemental walked quickly out of the wreckage to stop the skeleton from going into it, in fear that in his grief, he might get hurt. Despite there no longer being visible flames, the area was still very hot.

In the end, he didn't have to. The skeleton stop just short of reaching Grillby and fell to his knees. The bartender reached a hand towards the skeleton to help him back up.

Tears threaten to spill out of the tall skeleton's eyes. "OUR HOUSE! … OUR HOU... GRILLBY! WHAT HAPPENED?! DID YOU HAVE AN ACCIDENT?!"

Grillby retrieved his hand and straightened his back. "What? No!"

"GRILLBY! WHAT DID YOU DO TO PAPYRUS HOUSE!?" accused Undyne from just far enough to avoid the elemental's natural heat but still close enough to be threatening.

"I did not…"

"Undyne! I… I'm sure there is a good reason why he did it!" said Alphys trying her best to breathe through her nose and not pant her words out.

Grillby dropped his arms to his sides and looked up at the sky in quiet frustration.

" . . .Down" he said in one fiery breath.

"OH!" said Papyrus looking at his former home sadly. "THEN HOW….?"

Grillby offered his hand again and this time Papyrus accepted it and got back on his feet. "I'm afraid I don't know. It was already engulfed in flames when I got here"

Undyne and Alphys exchanged worried glances.

"No...nobody saw what happened?" asked Alphys.

Grillby spread his arms and brought them up in a shrug. "Everyone just assumed that it had been me" There was probably more sarcasm in that statement that he intended, but he hardly ever used sarcasm, so he wasn't sure. The few remaining monsters witnessing the abrupt reunion looked away a little bit embarrassed.

"I'm sorry" said Alphys.

"Yeah, me too" added Undyne.

"HE COULDN'T HAVE …. COULD HE?" said Papyrus, more to himself than anybody else. His voice sounded distant.

Grillby raised a fiery eyebrow. "Who's "he", Papyrus?" he asked, gently.

Papyrus didn't respond. Instead he started walking towards the back of the house.

"Hey, Papyrus…" said Alphys and hurried up to catch up with the skeleton. Undyne followed her.

"Who's "he"?" asked Grillby again as Alphys and Undyne walked briskly past him.

"His dad" answered Undyne over her shoulder.

Well, that just created more questions. And where was Sans anyway?

He followed the trio to the back of the house. Grillby had never realized that there had been a back room there. As he looked at the smoky remains, his instincts told him that the initial fire must've happened here. It looked blacker and more decimated than the rest of the house.

"Papyrus! Be careful!" said Alphys as the skeleton rushed into the middle of the former lab area.

Papyrus had never gone back in the back room after the Core incident. He had been subconsciously aware of its existence, but never felt the need to go back there. He looked at the burnt shapes around him, not being able to recognize what any of them had been before the fire. Maybe a table? A bed? A box? Their home was gone. Why?...

He looked around but he already knew it was of no use. There was _nothing_ left. He looked towards Undyne, Alphys and Grillby and shook his head.

"Well, there goes plan b" said Undyne.

Grillby waited patiently for someone to remember that he was still there and politely explain what this whole situation was about, but after a couple of minutes of listening to the trio exchange phrases that mentioned things like "Core", and 'Shutdown", and "Soul" in tense tones, he was on the verge of clearing his throat for a second time.

It was when he heard Sans' name that he went ahead and cleared his throat loudly.

"What about Sans?" he asked.

* * *

Notes: Sorry guys, I been taking care of sick family for the last few days. I did not want to keep you guys waiting any longer, so I'm releasing this in two parts (Is a big chapter but it is the last one, so I ended up adding a bunch of stuff that I hinted at but I wasn't planning on adding, but then changed my mind and added it and it's looking to be the biggest chapter of the entire series. So yeah, bad planning on my part. In any case, I hope you stick around for part II.


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